Code Name Verity by Elizabeth Wein

Paperback, 447 pages

Published February 6th 2012 by Egmont Press 

Oct. 11th, 1943-A British spy plane crashes in Nazi-occupied France. Its pilot and passenger are best friends. One of the girls has a chance at survival. The other has lost the game before it's barely begun.

When "Verity" is arrested by the Gestapo, she's sure she doesn't stand a chance. As a secret agent captured in enemy territory, she's living a spy's worst nightmare. Her Nazi interrogators give her a simple choice: reveal her mission or face a grisly execution.

As she intricately weaves her confession, Verity uncovers her past, how she became friends with the pilot Maddie, and why she left Maddie in the wrecked fuselage of their plane. On each new scrap of paper, Verity battles for her life, confronting her views on courage, failure and her desperate hope to make it home. But will trading her secrets be enough to save her from the enemy?

A Michael L. Printz Award Honor book that was called "a fiendishly-plotted mind game of a novel" in The New York Times, Code Name Verity is a visceral read of danger, resolve, and survival that shows just how far true friends will go to save each other.

I posted earlier about the free audiobooks from Audiobooksync.com and if you haven't taken advantage, you need to! This was one of the downloads from last week and all I can say is WOW! This book is a fantastic read, but it was so much better with the audio! The book is told in two parts and each part represents a character's point of view of the story. The narrators are FANTASTIC! The accents (Scottish, British, German, English) are all what really made the story for me. I can read with an idea of what the accents should be, but to have an authentic reading... totally made the story! I highly recommend this novel!!


Teaching Ideas:
This is a great mentor text for WWII for Social Studies teachers. Elizabeth Wein does a phenomenal job at the end of the audiobook explaining how she found the pieces which inspired the story. She also explains how she took liberties with pieces. This would be great for ELA teachers to allow students to see how a writer goes through the writing process, their inspiration, and how they research. 


Find out more about Elizabeth here and see what her upcoming projects, more about her books, and much more!

Happy reading!