One Day the Soldiers Came
Voices of Children in War
Chapter One
"Innocent in the Ways of the World"
Childhood and War
It happened to Keto. He was sitting in school with his brother listening to the teacher recite their French lesson. Je m'appelle, tu t'appelle, il s'appelle. . . .
It happened to Michael. He was at home with his mother and father. He sat in the back room doing whatever it is that teenage boys do in back rooms, daydreaming, making plans, goofing off.
It happened to Nora on a sunny day. She was playing in the front of her house.
Patience and Charity were too young to remember what they were doing when it happened.
It happened to Nicholas, as it happened to the others. To his entire village, one day, it happened.
The soldiers came.
"It was a sunny day," Nora says, as if the weather were the most amazing thing. How could it happen on a sunny day?
"They put a knife on my neck," she says, the little blonde. Picture her at eight years old, smiling and playing in ... read full excerpt from One Day the Soldiers Came ebook
