Anna and the Swallow Man

by Gavriel Savit

Overview

“[A] splendid debut novel. . . . This is masterly storytelling.” —The New York Times
 
Set in Poland during the Second World War, Anna and the Swallow Man is a stunning, literary, and wholly original New York Times bestseller and Publishers Weekly best book of the year perfect for readers of The Book Thief and All the Light We Cannot See.
 
Kraków, 1939. A million marching soldiers and a thousand barking dogs. This is no place to grow up. Anna Łania is just seven years old when the Germans take her father, a linguistics professor, during their purge of intellectuals in Poland. She’s alone.
 
And then Anna meets the Swallow Man. He is a mystery, strange and tall, a skilled deceiver with more than a little magic up his sleeve. And when the soldiers in the streets look at him, they see what he wants them to see.
 
The Swallow Man is not Anna’s father—she knows that very well—but she also knows that, like her father, he’s in danger of being taken, and like her father, he has a gift for languages: Polish, Russian, German, Yiddish, even Bird. When he summons a bright, beautiful swallow down to his hand to stop her from crying, Anna is entranced. She follows him into the wilderness.
 
Over the course of their travels together, Anna and the Swallow Man will dodge bombs, tame soldiers, and even, despite their better judgment, make a friend. But in a world gone mad, everything can prove dangerous. Even the Swallow Man.
 
“Exquisite.” —The Wall Street Journal
 
“A graceful story steeped in history, magic, myth, and archetype.” —The Horn Book Magazine, Starred
 
“This deeply moving debut novel casts naivete against the cruel backdrop of inhumanity.” —Publishers Weekly, Starred
 
“[A] quiet exploration of love and its limits.” —The Bulletin, Starred

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780553522068
Publisher:	Random House Children's Books
Publication date:	01/26/2016
Pages:	240
Product dimensions:	5.50(w) x 8.10(h) x 0.90(d)
Age Range:	12 - 17 Years

About the Author

Gavriel Savit holds a BFA in musical theater from the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, where he grew up. As an actor and singer, Gavriel has performed on three continents, from New York to Brussels to Tokyo. He lives in Brooklyn. This is his first novel. Learn more about Gavriel on the Web at GavrielSavit.com.

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Excerpted from "Anna and the Swallow Man"
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Copyright © 2016 Gavriel Savit.
Excerpted by permission of Random House Children's Books.
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Excerpts are provided by Dial-A-Book Inc. solely for the personal use of visitors to this web site.

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Editorial Reviews

…[a] splendid debut novel…This is masterly storytelling…The book's third-person narrative voice is intelligent, confiding and personable—indeed, precocious—rather like Anna herself. From the first page, Savit makes no concession to reading level, age or target audience. He simply takes pleasure in what he's writing. I have to admit, this is the way I like it, and any potentially problematic precocity in the text is saved by his earnest, accessible voice…Little of the plot is linear. It's more anecdotal, describing habitual patterns in the lives of the two main characters as they wander and survive. But while the novel's action is simple, its emotional impact, drive, narration, character development and resolution are elaborately layered.

The New York Times Book Review - Elizabeth Wein

★ 11/02/2015
Like Life Is Beautiful and The Boy in the Striped Pajamas, this deeply moving debut novel, set in Poland and Germany during WWII, casts naïveté against the cruel backdrop of inhumanity. Late one autumn morning, seven-year-old Anna is put under the care of a pharmacist. Her father is supposed to retrieve her in a few hours, but he never returns. Cast from her caretaker’s shop, Anna has nowhere to turn until she falls in with a reluctant stranger, a tall, reticent man. Thus begins a years-long journey through the woods and beyond that draws Anna closer and closer to the strange man, who communicates with birds and speaks in metaphors (“Everything he said—even, perhaps especially, the things he left out—seemed to carry the reliable weight of truth”). In his quiet yet firm manner, the Swallow Man teaches Anna lessons of survival, some of which challenge her instincts to be honest and compassionate. Savit’s economical prose beautifully captures a child’s loss of innocence and the spiritual challenges that emerge when a safe world suddenly becomes threatening. The subject matter and gritty imagery may be too intense for some younger readers, but those knowledgeable of wartime atrocities will recognize the profundity of the bond of trust built between two strangers who become increasingly dependent on each other. Ages 12–up. Agent: Catherine Drayton, Inkwell Management. (Jan.)

Publishers Weekly

A New York Times Bestseller
A Publishers Weekly Best Book of the Year

“[A] splendid debut novel. . . . This is masterly storytelling.” —The New York Times

"Chilling yet tender." —People Magazine

"Savit’s economical prose beautifully captures a child’s loss of innocence and the spiritual challenges that emerge when a safe world suddenly becomes threatening." —Publishers Weekly, Starred Review

"The third-person narrative—lyrical, fluid, with a pervasive shadow of menace—lends a folkloric feel to a graceful story steeped in history, magic, myth, and archetype; comparisons to The Book Thief are apt." —The Horn Book, Starred Review

"Savit’s novel, with its wise, philosophical narrator, has the classic feel and elegant, precise language of a book that’s been around forever." —Shelf Awareness, Starred Review

"[A] quiet exploration of love and its limits." —The Bulletin of the Center for Children's Books, Starred Review

"Artful, original, insightful." —Kirkus Reviews

"A moving, thought-provoking story about coming-of-age in the midst of trauma." —Booklist 

“The Book Thief. The Boy in the Striped Pajamas. Any book compared to both of these is in my eyes sure to have an exciting plot, be a fantastic eye opener, and have loveable characters. Anna and the Swallow Man did not disappoint. Just go and read it—it is impossible not to love." —The Guardian

“The story is powerful enough to resonate with all ages....Savit's novel, though a quick read, is a powerful one. And just like the child is follows, it has a deeper poignancy masked by its seemingly simple surface." —Mashable

"Written like a love song for language — heartbreaking and entrancing and filled with characters whose survival is intimately, sometimes tragically, tied to their love of words." —Bustle
 
“Exquisite.” —The Wall Street Journal
 

From the Publisher

12/01/2015
Gr 8 Up—In 1939 Krakow, seven-year-old Anna realizes her linguist father is not coming back from a meeting of university professors who have been summoned by the Gestapo. She can speak many languages and converse with adults, and she's able to adapt to her surroundings as Anja, Khannaleh, Anke, or whichever persona she chooses. Her father's friend, Herr Doktor Fuchsmann, becomes fearful about hiding her, so she takes to the streets, following a tall man with a doctor's bag who talks to birds. The Swallow Man's name is never learned, but the pair wander the countryside together for four years, in a story that gradually becomes less plot-based and more allegorical. There is plenty of bird imagery, suggesting the Swallow Man might be a trickster, as he swoops, nests, and eats little but dried bread. Yet there are also hints he has run from some nefarious involvement in the war and no longer wants to be "an instrument of death." Spare dialogue and elegant prose are filled with subtleties, including the language Swallow Man and Anna agree to use to keep her safe, called the "Road." Though Anna is a child at the beginning, she ages over the course of this novel, which gets darker and more violent toward the end. When Reb Hirschl, a burly and friendly Jewish man they meet in the woods, is killed and an unscrupulous doctor asks Anna to strip in exchange for medicine, it is a loss of innocence the author compares to hatching from the egg so that she will fly on her own. VERDICT More interpretive than literal, the story will generate discussion among YA readers.—Vicki Reutter, State University of New York at Cortland

School Library Journal

Allan Corduner’s deep voice pairs well with the graceful, intelligent prose in this mesmerizing account of a girl whose life in Krakow, Poland, is altered forever by the encroaching horror of WWII. Seven years old when her father, a professor, is taken by the Nazis and too young to fend for herself, Anna is taken under the wing of the Swallow Man, an enigmatic stranger who teaches her “the ways of the road.” Crisscrossing the countryside, hiding from Germans, Russians, and Poles, the two oddly matched yet infinitely well-suited travelers are joined for a time by a Jewish musician, whose firmly held beliefs of right and wrong set the stage for an exploration of the morality of self-preservation. Corduner’s elegant, discreet voicing and measured pacing keep listeners focused on the three main characters in a wrenching coming-of-age story that will appeal to adults as well as thoughtful mature teens. S.G. Winner of AudioFile Earphones Award © AudioFile 2016, Portland, Maine

JANUARY 2016 - AudioFile

2015-11-03
After a young girl is left to fend for herself in World War II Poland, she stumbles upon an intriguing gentleman who she hopes will guide her out of the emerging chaos of war. Anna Lania is 7 at the start of this multiyear tale with its overtones of folklore and magical realism. Her linguistics-professor father is taken away by the Germans during the expulsion of intellectuals at Jagiellonian University in Krakow. A linguist herself, Anna is drawn to the language abilities and bird savvy of the Swallow Man, so named to preserve his anonymity. As they make their way together across Poland, the Swallow Man has ingenious ways of explaining their new realities to Anna via storytelling while his real activities remain an enigma until the end. Most striking here is that debut author Savit creates a young girl's world that only consists of father figures—and it is not always clear how Anna is to determine whom to trust and whether or not these relationships and how she thinks of them are ultimately safe. The eventual conclusion: human connection, however brief or imperfect, has the potential to save us all. Artful, original, insightful. (Historical fiction. 12 & up)

Kirkus Reviews