The Snow Goose

This book by Paul Gallico will get more well deserved attention, now that Michael Morpurgo has chosen it as his neglected classic for the Radio 4 program, Open Book
I was surprised to hear that it was on the list, as I was expecting long novels. It is quite a short story, just four chapters - you can read it in an evening.
It sits alongside Winnie the Pooh as one of the few books I have read to all my children at the same time.  Not that I would suggest that it is a children's book, rather that it is very accessible - Michael Morpurgo thinks he read it first when he was eleven.
It is also a cracking story, of wild open seascape, of an unlikely friendship that develops between a young girl and a recluse living alone in a lighthouse, drawn together as they care for an injured bird she discovers.
As you get lost in a story that could have taken place at any time in the last thousand years, there comes a sharp recognition that it actually is taking place in1940, and the call to take British troops of the beach at Dunkirk breaks into the story.
The mood changes, and the voice of the story teller changes, and the story draws to its conclusion, and my children realise that they have to read the final paragraph themselves, as I struggle to keep reading amid all the emotion.
A great read. Very Recommended.