Gone to War: stories of soldiers for teens
compiled 1/17/06

Code Talker by Joseph Bruchac
YA FIC BRUC
After being taught in a boarding school run by whites that Navajo is a useless language, Ned Begay and other Navajo men are recruited by the Marines to become Code Talkers, sending messages during World War II in their native tongue.

Soldier Boy by Brian Burks
YA FIC BURK
A boy who grew up in the slums of late nineteenth-century Chicago runs away, joins the cavalry, and fights in the battle of Little Big Horn.

The Winter Hero by James Lincoln Collier and Christopher Collier
YA FIC COLL
Anxious to be a hero, a young boy relates how he becomes involved in Shays' Rebellion begun by farmers in western Massachusetts against unfair taxation levied on them by the Boston government.

Under a War-Torn Sky by Laura Elliott
YA FIC ELLI
After his plane is shot down by Hitler's Luftwaffe, nineteen-year-old Henry Forester of Richmond, Virginia, strives to walk across occupied France, with the help of the French Resistance, in hopes of rejoining his unit.

Soldier Boys by Dean Hughes
YA FIC HUGH
Two boys, one German and one American, are eager to join their respective armies during World War II, and their paths cross at the Battle of the Bulge.

B for Buster by Iain Lawrence
YA FIC LAWR
Kak runs away from home to enlist in the Canadian Air Force during World War II.

Heroes Don't Run: a novel of the Pacific War by Harry Mazer
YA FIC MAZE
To honor his father who died during the Japanese invasion of Pearl Harbor, seventeen-year-old Adam eagerly enlists in the Marines in 1944, survives boot camp, and faces combat on the tiny island of Okinawa.

Masada: the last fortress by Gloria Miklowitz
YA FIC MIKL
As the Roman army marches inexorably across the Judean desert towards the fortress of Masada, Simon and his family and friends prepare, along with the rest of the Jewish Zealots, to fight and never surrender.

Private Peaceful by Michael Morpurgo
YA FIC MORP
When Thomas Peaceful's older brother is forced to join the British Army, Thomas decides to sign up as well, although he is only fourteen years old, to prove himself to his country, his family, his childhood love, Molly, and himself.

Fallen Angels by Walter Dean Myers
YA FIC MYER
Seventeen-year-old Richie Perry, just out of his Harlem high school, enlists in the Army in the summer of 1967 and spends a devastating year on active duty in Vietnam.

Soldier's heart: being the story of the enlistment and due service of the boy Charley Goddard in the First Minnesota Volunteers: a novel of the Civil War by Gary Paulsen
YA FIC PAUL
Eager to enlist, fifteen-year-old Charley has a change of heart after experiencing both the physical horrors and mental anguish of Civil War combat.

All Quiet on the Western Front by Erich Maria Remarque
YA FIC REMA
Five German students are drafted into World War I.

The Boys from St. Petri by Bjarne Reuter
YA FIC REUT
In 1942, a group of young men begin a series of increasingly dangerous protests against the German invaders of their Danish homeland.

Eyes of the Emperor by Graham Salisbury
YA FIC SALI
Following orders from the United States Army, several young Japanese-American men train K-9 units to hunt Asians during World War II.

Anson's Way by Gary D. Schmidt
YA FIC SCHM
While serving as a British Fencible to maintain the peace in Ireland, Anson finds that his sympathy for a hedge master places him in conflict with the law of King George II.

Braving the Fire by John B. Severance
YA FIC SEVE
Jem joins the Union Army but is not sure of his motives or what he hopes to accomplish, particularly since the Civil War has divided his family and caused much violence and confusion in his life.

Kipling's Choice by Geert Spillebeen
YA FIC SPIL
In 1915, mortally wounded in Loos, France, eighteen-year-old John Kipling, son of writer Rudyard Kipling, remembers his boyhood and the events leading to what is to be his first and last World War I battle.

And In The Morning by John Wilson
YA FIC WILS
When fifteen-year-old Jim Hay's father is killed in World War I, Jim is compelled to leave his native Scotland to fight, and struggles with the horrors of war as he tries to survive in the trenches of France.

Soldier X by Don Wulffson
YA FIC WULF
In 1943 sixteen-year-old Erik experiences the horrors of war when he is drafted into the German army and sent to fight on the Russian front.