Sweet Skies

Berlin after the Second World War was a bleak place, divided into segments each ruled by the victors Life was hard for the population, especially for the children, many of whom had known nothing but war. Otto Hartmann is one of those children, living with his mother in the cellar of the house that once was their home now occupied by a British officer. His father is a prisoner of war, and his sister is missing. Otto who has lost an eye during the war, has a dream of becoming a pilot like his father, who returns home a broken man without hope. The one excitement in the midst of scavenging for Otto and his friends, Ilse and Karl, is the arrival of the American aircraft, part of the Berlin airlift organized by the Allies to keep Berliners from starving after the blockade by the Russians. Otto is befriended by Charlie, one of the pilots, but when Charlie asks him for a souvenir this sets off a chain of events in which Otto, Karl and Ilse push their luck for the sheer chance of a different life.

This is a downbeat story in many ways; though Otto appears indomitable, his dreams for the future are cruelly broken by his father. The world Robin Scott-Elliot has painted is very real, and readers will want to grasp any chance of hope for Otto they can.

A photograph at the end of the book shows German children watching an aircraft just above them. There is also an historical note, although it does not explain that Berlin was divided up at Yalta by the Allies, not just America, and that the British also flew in the Berlin airlift.