War and Millie McGonigle

Millie McGonigle lives in sunny California, where her days are filled with beach and surf. It should be perfect—but times are tough. Hitler is attacking Europe and it looks like the United States may be going to war. Food is rationed and money is tight. And Millie's sickly little sister gets all the attention and couldn't be more of a pain if she tried. It's all Millie can do to stay calm and feel in control.

Still—there's sand beneath her feet. A new neighbor from the city, who has a lot to teach Millie. And surfer boy Rocky to admire—even if she doesn't have the guts to talk to him.

It's a time of sunshine, siblings, and stress. Will Millie be able to find her way in her family, and keep her balance as the the world around her loses its own?

Behind the Book

On December 7, 1941, war came to America’s children. Some picked up toy guns and shot at pretend enemies. Others had nightmares for the rest of their lives. Millie McGonigle thought the war came like an earthquake and shook everything and everybody up. I wondered how she, after suffering through the depravations of the Depression, coped with the upheaval. I knew she’d need to find courage and solace somewhere.

For many years I’d heard my husband’s stories about their small house on Mission Bay. The warm bay water lapped at the sand when the tide was in. There was swimming and surfing, and children went without shoes from June until September, and their feet grew calloused and summer wide. Phil would row his small boat out where the reeds and grass grew tall and read comic books until his nose was sunburned and his empty stomach growled.

Most intriguing to me as I listened were descriptions of the vast mudflats, stinking, slippery, and mysterious, which appeared like magic when the tide was out. The mud was pocked with pickleweed and eelgrass. Shoals and small islands, home to colonies of mussels and sand dollars that stood on end in soldier-like rows, were revealed.

I knew I wanted this for anxious, fearful, worried Millie. As the the world changed, Millie could find strength and wisdom through simple things and the natural world, nurtured and soothed by the tides flowing in and out, the fishy smell of the mud flats, the squawks of the gulls, the peace of the small waves on the bay, and the sparkle of the sun on the quiet blue water. So Millie moved into South Mission Beach, San Diego, and you can find her and her story there