Line of Fire: Diary of an Unknown Soldier

The hundred-year-old diary that forms the text of this work was found by French author-illustrator Barroux on a Paris sidewalk in a heap of trash. In entries rendered smoothly into English by Ardizzone, the anonymous author tells of his first months as an infantryman in WWI. Barroux (Mr. Leon’s Paris) quarters the pages, providing rough, black charcoal drawings for each sentence or two of text. He conveys the monotony and dread of the soldier’s life: the endless digging of trenches, the sight of wounded soldiers and fleeing families, the way dark and rain make everything worse. Only the clunky triangular noses and gentle features Barroux gives his human faces soften the grimness. Before long the narrator is wounded, and he describes his stay in the hospital, surrounded by suffering (“while a gunner who had been begging to die since the morning breathes his last”). The diary finishes abruptly: “Sometimes I’m sorry I didn’t stay in the line of fire.” The documentary-style pacing makes this account best suited to those with an established interest in accounts of military life, but it remains a remarkable artifact, given haunting new life. Ages 10–13. (July)■