Tulips for Breakfast (Catherine Bauer, Ford Street)
Tulips for Breakfast follows teenager Lena, who has settled into her new life in a Dutch town after she and her parents fled Germany as one of many Jewish families seeking refuge in the late 1930s due to Hitler’s rising influence. As the Nazi party’s power expands beyond German borders towards the Netherlands, Lena’s life moves from relative freedom to pre-war tensions. Her worries escalate as personal freedoms are curtailed. When Lena’s parents announce they must flee further and she is to take refuge with a family friend, her shock and outrage can be felt from the page. Feeling abandoned and facing a life in hiding, Lena chafes against the restrictions of her new life and, as conditions in the Netherlands worsen, she starts to take risks that expose her and the benefactor giving her refuge. Tulips for Breakfast is an engaging story, encouraging readers to empathise with what life was like for young Jewish people caught up in war. Catherine Bauer is particularly adept at showing how surreal it was for young people to be thrust into wartime—how ordinary their lives felt and how shocking it was to have their entire lives pulled away from them. Tulips for Breakfast is ideal for teen readers moved by the diary of Anne Frank or who enjoy historical fiction from authors such as Jackie French and Kirsty Murray.
Lefa Singleton Norton is a writer and bookseller from Naarm/Melbourne.
Books+Publishing pre-publication reviews are supported by the Copyright Agency Cultural Fund.
