It’s 1942. Joe is representative of many young American men of his generation: America and its Allies are at war with the Germans and the Japanese, and this New Hampshire teenager wants to be in the thick of it.
Joe got his wish in the spring of 1944.
In Code Name Sonny, a first novel by author Ken Pottie, the writer takes readers on a thrilling journey, zigzagging back and forth between Sonny’s World War II experiences and Jack’s modern-day investigation into his dad’s war service, as the latter tries to unravel mysteries by tying together pieces of historical recollection with current news stories.
When the past and the present collide, Jack realizes too late the danger lurking close to home.
Spy!
It was a spring day in 1944 when Joe and Raymond raced each other through the school’s front gate moments after the closing school bell rang. The sun felt warm on their skin, but as they made their way downtown, chilly gusts reminded them that shards of winter were still in the air. It was still not warm enough to go outdoors without their winter coats; that time of year when you need to carry one, just in case.
Weather wasn’t top of mind for the two friends today. They were on a special mission that afternoon: They wanted to be the first to discover what was causing the biggest buzz of excitement they could recall in their quiet town.
The FBI had arrested the owner of the French River Inn, Mr. Leopold von Sliedricht, a suspected Nazi spy. Sliedricht was a White Russian who hired Jewish workers at his establishment, so no one in town ever suspected a traitor in their midst.
The FBI had been tracking von Sliedricht’s activities and correspondence for months. They worked on a series of tips they had received from von Sliedricht’s disgruntled wife.
The boys turned on to Lincoln Street, coats open to the wind, hair flying, heaving breath casting frosty explosions as they dodged cars and leaped over potholes, too excited even to speak.
They glanced at each other in silent disbelief that World War II had encroached on their sleepy New England town.
Joe and Raymond skidded to a halt at a makeshift roadblock that kept cars and pedestrians from the scene. Town police stood at guard behind wooden barriers that they had erected there from the townsfolk’s workshops and barns.
Behind the police line, eleven men in dark suits and hats carrying Tommy guns were directing army personnel with mine detectors, poking at the bushes around the establishment, and raising cellar doors at the back of the tavern. Meanwhile, a steady stream of State Guardsmen moved in and out of the inn’s front entrance, carrying crates to two waiting army trucks, where they stacked them row upon row. Six army soldiers with rifles kept a watchful eye over the loading operation.
The news of the FBI arrest was traveling fast, and the boys grinned with delight at their front row seats, watching in silence as an FBI agent shoved Mr. von Sliedricht headfirst into a black Packard sedan, his hands in cuffs behind his back.
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