Like my earlier novel, Hero on a Bicycle, this story is set in the Second World War, but in a very different place: a suburb of Liverpool during the terrifying winter of 1940– 41, when the city was relentlessly bombarded almost every night by Hitler’s Nazi airforce, the Luftwaffe.
I was living there then, aged thirteen, so it was very easy for me to imagine what it was like for Joan, my fictional heroine, her mum, her older sister, Audrey, her brother, Brian, and her younger sister, Judy (who, like all younger sisters, can be a bit of a pain at times!). Their father was lost at sea while serving in the Merchant Navy, and the family are struggling on as best they can.
Wartime, when it was not frightening, could be very boring. There were no holidays – the seaside was covered with barbed wire and gun emplacements. Travel was discouraged unless absolutely necessary, and endless time was spent queuing for food. The rationing system was very fair but restrictive – just enough to keep everyone healthy. Luxuries like sweets were a rarity. Nice clothes and, worst of all, nylon stockings, were almost unobtainable. Except, of course, on the black market, which no patriotic person would have stooped to using.
All troublesome enough, but in Whistling in the Dark, everything is further complicated because Joan’s mum is being courted by the pompous bore Captain Ronnie Harper Jones. None of the children, except Judy, can stand him. He is stationed locally and never seems to be short of much-coveted luxury food supplies.
Despite the war and trouble at home, Joan and her friends somehow manage to have a good time, going to the cinema (Blitz-allowing), collecting salvage with a handcart and listening to the radio.
It is into this scene that a mysterious man appears – first seen by Joan as a face at the window. And a series of events unfold which emanate from Nazi-occupied Europe, where conditions make life in war-torn Britain look like a bed of roses.
But the real heroes of this story are the men of the Merchant Navy, who, like Joan’s dad and Audrey’s boyfriend, Dai, risked their lives to bring food and vital supplies across the icy U-boat-infested Atlantic Ocean and saved Britain from starvation and defeat. They were poorly paid and ill-armed to retaliate when they were attacked, and their bravery is one of the great heroic achievements of the Second World War.
