Night Witches: A Novel of World War II - Kathryn Lasky Audiobook

Written by Kathryn Lasky
Read by Ilyana Kadushin
Format: MP3
Bitrate: 64 Kbps
Unabridged

Publisher: Scholastic Audio
Release date: April 1, 2017
Duration: 06:17:00

From best-selling and award-winning author Kathryn Lasky comes an explosive adventure following the teen girl fighter pilots who took on Hitler’s army…and won.

15-year-old Valya knows what it feels like to fly. She’s a pilot who’s always felt more at home soaring through the sky than down on earth. But since the Germans surrounded Stalingrad, Valya’s been forced to stay on the ground and watch her city crumble. When her mother is killed during the siege, Valya is left with one burning desire: to join up with her older sister, a member of the famous and feared Night Witches—a brigade of young female pilots.

Using all her wits, Valya manages to get past the German blockage and find the Night Witches’ base…and that’s when the REAL danger starts. The women have been assigned a critical mission. If they succeed, they’ll inflict serious damage on the Nazis. If they fail, they’ll face death…or even worse horrors.

Historical fiction master Lasky sheds light on the war’s unsung heroes—daredevil girls who took to the skies to fight for their country—in an action-packed thrill ride that’ll leave you electrified and breathless.

Narrator Ilyana Kadushin portrays 16-year-old Valya, who joins a Soviet regiment of women who serve as pilots during WWII. With a passionate voice, Kadushin establishes a Russian accent to reflect the backgrounds of these brave characters who fight in harsh conditions to defend their country from the German army. After her mother is killed by Germans, Valya faces danger in risky air raids, and when her older sister, Tatyana, goes missing, she must stay hopeful that they’ll be reunited. Listeners will be intrigued by this fictional depiction of some of the forgotten heroines of WWII…. � AudioFile

Historical Note….The Germans nicknamed them the Nachthexen, or “night witches,” because the whooshing noise their flimsy plywood planes made resembled that of a sweeping broom. “This sound was the only warning the Germans had. The planes were too small to show up on radar… [or] on infrared locators,” said Steve Prowse, author of the screenplay The Night Witches, a History Channel nonfiction account of the little-known female squadron. “They never used radios, so radio locators couldn’t pick them up either. They were basically ghosts.”