Being alone is hard. Being alone during one of the most tragic times in history is unimaginable. Everybody needed someone to help each other get by. In the novels Milkweed by Jerry Spinelli and North of Danger by Dale Fife, the theme “You can’t always prepare yourself for what lies ahead” is shown by identity, betrayal, and survival. The authors express the theme by making the narrators young, naive kids who are on their own in cold, European countries during WWII. They have to survive on their own as the Nazis invade; only hoping things to go right.
One of the topics in Milkweed is identity. At first all Misha was, was a thief. He met Uri, and Uri asked him what him name was. “I gave him my name. ‘Stopthief.’” (Spinelli 3) He thought so, because that’s what
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On page 4, Uri took him to meet the other boys. They thought he was a Jew just like all of them, but they saw his yellow stone, and he became a Gypsy. “On the first day that the light went out, Uri said to me, ‘Okay, this is who you are. Your name is Misha Pilsudski.’” (Spinelli 29) Uri wanted to get to know him, but first, Misha needed to know himself; even if his backstory was fake. Misha met a girl when he was stealing: Janina Milgrom, and they became close. He went with her to live in the ghetto, and brought food to her family (smuggling). Misha slept with them, and when Uncle Shepsel protested, Mr. Milgrom said that he was family now. “From the moment Mr. Milgrom said, ‘He is now,’ my identity as a Gypsy vanished.” (Spinelli 104) He had turned into a jew, and now he was “in for it,” as the boys liked to say. But the Ghetto Police were cracking down on smuggling, and there were rumors of trains coming to take the Jews away.
Another topic in both books is betrayal. In Milkweed by Jerry Spinelli, Uri is like Misha’s big brother, but starts leaving for days at a time. One night when Misha is smuggling, he walks into the Blue Camel Hotel and spots Uri