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The Boy at the Top of the MountainJohn Boyne
The Boy at the Top of the Mountain
by John Boyne
Orphaned Pierrot is taken to his aunt's household high in the Bavarian Alps, which turns out to be Hitler's, and he begins to admire the man.
A story about children and a grown-up villain, thoughtful and moving in tone. We would put it with children of 11–13, and at a reading age of about 11 for reading alone.
Worth knowing before you buy
- A death or grief
- Death in wartime
- Cruel adults
None of this makes it a bad book — often the opposite. It is here so you can decide whether it is right for your child now or in a year or two.
Our take on this book
Pierrot, an orphaned French boy, is sent to live with his aunt, who is a housekeeper at a grand house high in the German mountains — which turns out to be the Berghof, Hitler's mountain retreat — and the reader watches, with mounting dread, as the attention of a monstrous man slowly corrupts an ordinary boy. John Boyne writes a chilling, important novel about how easily innocence can be turned, tracking Pierrot's gradual transformation from a kind child into something colder as he is drawn into the Nazi world. It is a serious, upsetting book by design, dealing with the Holocaust's approach through one boy's moral ruin, and it is aimed at an older, thoughtful reader ready for genuinely dark history. For a reader of eleven upward it is a powerful, discussable novel about complicity and conscience — not a comfortable read, but a valuable one, best met by a child mature enough for its weight and ideally able to talk it over.
If they like this, try these
Chosen by matching age, reading age, tone and subject — not by what is selling.
Carrie's WarNina Bawden
Street ChildBerlie Doherty
The Boy in the Striped PyjamasJohn Boyne
Goodnight Mister TomMichelle Magorian
Listen to the MoonMichael Morpurgo
OnceMorris Gleitzman
Or let them write their own.
Nothing gets a child reading like a story they invented themselves. Your child plans the characters and the plot, and we write, illustrate and print it as a real book with their name on the cover as the author.
Find another book
Tell us the age, the reading age and what they like, and we will suggest a handful.