Book Review: Don’t Tell the Enemy  

By Marsha Forchuk Skrypuch 

4 Stars 

The book Don't Tell the Enemy by Marsha Forchuk Skrypuch is a book about Krystia, a teenager that lives in Ukraine when it was captured by the Soviets. This book is about how she survives without being spotted by the Soviets until one day the Soviets leave, and then come the Nazis. The Nazis looked nice and told them that Ukraine would get independence. However, that wasn't the case, as later the Nazis started killing and kidnapping the Jews and putting them into a concentration camp called the Ghetto. Krystia is worried because her best friend, Dolik, and other friends were trapped too. Krystia didn't like this and informed her cousins, who were spies stealing weapons from the Nazis, to help save them.  

In my opinion, this book has a very slow plot leading to the end. Since it was slow, I felt bored quite easily and was eager to read ahead by flipping through the pages to see what happened. This book was also filled with a lot of action, thriller and featured a lot of violence. Not only that, the book was also engaging emotionally, and the strong connections made it a lot more enjoyable. Also, the book was written with a lot of detail, which clearly helped me understand everything that was happening around Krystia and others. The characters, as well, were well-written, with all of them having unique personalities, such as Krystia's fierce and angry attitude towards the Nazis and Dolik's funny attitude throughout the story.   

Overall, I thoroughly enjoyed reading the majority of the book. The details were good, the characters were well thought out and were unique, but the plot was slow, which made the book feel a bit boring in my opinion. However, in my opinion, this is still one of the best World War II books I've ever read, and it will always be my favourite. 

Reviewed by Smaran 

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