The Year of the Bomb
Grade 4-7–In the 1950s in Sierra Madre, CA, four seventh graders, enamored of horror movies, have the thrill of a lifetime when a movie crew comes to town to filmInvasion of the Body Snatchers. Paul is the narrator. His colorful friends include the son of a blacklisted sound editor, a scrawny scaredy-cat, and a tough guy who can't help picking on the others. The Red Scare plays a prominent role as the boys investigate a professor at a nearby university who worked on the Manhattan Project and was friendly with a Russian spy. The novel covers a lot of ground. The boys are charming and real, although readers may come away wishing there had been more closure concerning the children's family lives and interpersonal relationships. Still, they will learn a lot about the era, and the details about the horror and science-fiction genres and the movie industry are stellar. Expect questions about spies and bombs, and circulation of 1950s horror flicks to skyrocket.–Jake Pettit, Thompson Valley High School, Loveland, COCopyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.--This text refers to theHardcoveredition.