Heavy Medal Mock Newbery Finalist: THE ENIGMA GIRLS by Candace Fleming
Introduction by Heavy Medal Award Committee Member Julie Williams
Breaking ciphers is laborious work involving trial and error, but in World War II it was a matter of life and death. With the German Enigma machine that changed every day the task was daunting, if not impossible. The men and women working at Bletchley Park knew that even if they were able to crack a cipher one day, “…tomorrow a new cipher will need to be broken… and the day after that…and the day after that…until the war ends.” (pg. 143)
How do you write a book that honors the thousands of people who worked tirelessly breaking ciphers in an engaging way?
First, you choose to focus on ten teenage girls and bring them to life. Each girl has chapters dedicated to their part of the whole operation, their life before the war, and how they spent their time. Details such as Sarah Norton’s teddy bear, shenanigans in the wheeled laundry basket, and pushing decrypts through a tunnel between buildings using a broom, make the events more personal and engaging. Periodically, Fleming “checks in” on the girls which anchors the reader to the humanity of the endeavor and not just the technical aspects of battles, machines, and codes.
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It’s not enough that the book is solidly researched and accurate, but it is presented in a style and format that is engaging. Starting at the first chapter with powerful imagery of Poland on September 1st, 1939 and continuing with short, concise chapters and funny anecdotes, Fleming holds the reader’s interest. Sprinkled throughout the text are “Top Secret: If You Were a Code and Cipher Cracker” chapters, which allow the reader to take a short break and learn the tricks of the trade, providing a deeper understanding of the task that these ten girls and others were facing day after day.
Highlighting specific breakthroughs in the code and the resulting war actions and reactions showed just how vital this work was during the war. In addition, Fleming made strong choices on length and details in the chapters with the text for chapter 5: “Lightning War” being short, concise, almost abrupt, matching the actions and emotions of that day. In contrast, chapter 14: “The Spy Enigma” was far more detailed and lengthy in describing the history of the Enigma machine.
This nonfiction book excels in presentation of information, style while also highlighting characters and painting a picture of the time and place and the urgency of the activities at Bletchley Park during World War II. The book ticks all the Newbery boxes for me and I am intrigued for the discussion to follow.
Heavy Medal Award Committee members and others are now invited to discuss this book further in the Comments section below. Let the Mock Newbery discussion begin!
Filed under: Book Discussion, Heavy Medal Mock
About Steven Engelfried
Steven Engelfried retired from full-time library work a couple years ago and now works as a part-time Youth Librarian at the West Linn Public Library in Oregon. He served on the 2010 Newbery committee, chaired the 2013 Newbery Committee, and also served on the 2002 Caldecott committee. You can reach him at sengelfried@yahoo.com.
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I was enthralled by this book and learned so much – it was a perfect pairing with the 2024 fiction release “The Bletchley Riddle”! Am I correct in seeing that NO nonfiction books have won the Newbery since 1988’s winner Lincoln: A Photobiography by Russell Freedman? Many more have been in the Honors category, but it would definitely be a major accomplishment for this book to take the main prize! I do think the storytelling element is strong, as are the informational segments interwoven throughout the book. I wonder what aspect of the book, though, pushes this above any other nonfiction book published in the past decades?
I also could not “put this book down.” (I listened to the audiobook) I kept wanting to tell everyone around me facts and anecdotes from the book. My favorites were when the girls tricked the high ranking officer into leaning against wet paint and when they were “illegally” toasting bread in closets and bald face lying to higher ups about it. I could have sworn that a NF had won the Newbery recently but I believe you’re right. I immediately thought of BOMB by Steve Sheinkin but it won an honor.
To answer your question, I’m not sure if it surpasses any of the nonfics who have received honors in the past years, so I would be more inclined to say this one is more likely to win an honor than the top prize. It has stayed in my mind and been super interesting to see all the WW2 and especially WW2 spy novels that have been published this year. The publishing trends are so interesting!
I reread this on a trip from Maine to upstate NY and kept telling my husband things I was finding out.
It is very interesting how there is this book that made our Mock Newbery and others, very similar like The Bletchley Riddle, did not. Candace Fleming did an expert job at crafting a nonfiction text that does not feel nonfiction, which gives literary merit indeed.
This book reminds me of The Mona Lisa Vanishes in how it tells a gripping story. How it has moments of reprieve for those who want to learn more. It’s very strong in style and I always appreciate that as would the Newbery Committee I think….
It took me until my second read to realize they (ENGIMA AND RIDDLE) were both about Bletchley park and that realization made me appreciate ENIGMA more because I felt Riddle was just too over the top. I really appreciated how well all the girls were characterized and how honest the accounts were. So impressive to get that good of characterization with that many characters in a nonfiction book. I also think setting really stands out and you can visualize where they are and what they’re doing and what the computer was like.
I think Riddle was more over the top because the characters knew too much and were too involved which wasn’t realistic whereas Enigma highlighted how little each individual knew.
Of all the WW2 era books I read for Mock Newbery, this one really stood out. I think it’s tied with Max in the House of Spies for me. I really appreciated how Fleming broke down and explained all of the aspects of code breaking. I read this one first out of a lot of the other WW2 books I read and it really helped contextualize those novels as well. Fleming did an excellent job of explaining a long, intricate dance back and forth between British code breakers and their Nazi counterparts. She also did a great job of breathing life into the girls she chose to highlight. Knowing that she was probably working off of primary documents probably without a ton of exposition, she did a great job of weaving in what they could have been feeling and thinking.
I listened to the audiobook and while this has no weight in Newbery criteria, the narrator was excellent and it was super easy to listen to. I did get the girls confused a little bit more because I was listening rather than reading. (I tend to read fast and listen sporadically.) But it was a super engaging listening experience on top of it being a top tier read!
You’re correct, Kate, about LINCOLN being the last nonfiction to win the Medal (not counting GOOD MASTERS, SWEET LADIES, a really unique book that some libraries keep in fiction, some in the 812’s for “drama”). Which can almost seems like it would put extra pressure on a Committee choosing. I’m thinking of Lauren’s comment that “I’m not sure if it surpasses any of the nonfics who have received honors in the past years…” It could be tempting to say that while ENIGMA GIRLS is excellent, it’s not as accomplished as BOMB or CLAUDETTE COLVIN TWICE TOWARDS JUSTICE (yes, I picked two Honor nonfiction books from my own Newbery years), so it shouldn’t be the one to break the streak. But of course the real Committee can only consider “books of the specified calendar year.” So they’ll need to compare ENIGMA GIRLS to the other nonfiction of this year, as well as HANK HOOPERMAN, KAREEM BETWEEN, and all of the other excellent 2024 titles. Should be interesting…
I was a little worried that I wouldn’t enjoy ENIGMA GIRLS because I generally don’t enjoy nonfiction as much, but I too could not put this book down. This being a book about WW2, the stakes were obviously high and the plot enticing – but what stood out to me most were the moments that others have already mentioned about the girls’ personal experiences at Bletchley Park. As a 21st-century reader, I have the benefit of knowing the outcome of WW2, yet I STILL felt the girls’ urgency at deciphering the Italian Naval Enigma and working through the Blitz, not knowing how many more bombs were going to drop on London before they managed to decipher the Germans’ Enigma machine (pgs. 101-106, 69-78). So when Mavis went to the movies with her sweetheart and heard the announcement that the Italian navy had been defeated, I felt the joy that she wasn’t allowed to share with anybody because her work was top secret. I’d say Candace Fleming did an excellent job of potraying the lives, concerns, and joys of the ten girls she chose to focus on. Plot and delineation of characters are certainly two strengths of this book.
I also enjoyed the information breaks about the Enigma machine and the difference between codes and ciphers at the end of each section. They were clear and very well-presented. These along with the photos really beefed up the informative aspects of the book to remind us that, while incredibly entertaining, ENIGMA GIRLS is not just a compelling narrative; it is a book meant to inform. Will it receive the top award of the year though? It’s a tough call. Middle grade books about WW2 are plenty, and while I would readily say that this one stands out among the bunch and among middle grade nonfiction titles, like Steven says, it’s not up against past books. It’s up against other nonfiction AND fiction titles of 2024 like HANK HOOPERMAN and THE COLOR OF SOUND. That’s pretty steep competition….
I was all set to rebut comments about delineation of character but no one has really brought it up 🙂 There are 10 characters and I think Fleming does a good job fleshing them out with the information she had available. Why 10 characters? The work was so secretive that there were very few, if any, who knew the full scope, so in order to get the full scope you need a wide cast of characters. She anchored us back to the characters several times in the book with anecdotes. Could I tell you now who did what – no, but in the telling of the tale they were each unique.
Having read this and Bletchley Riddle I noticed a fact that was mentioned in Bletchley and not Enigma. No spoilers but, at the time, I wondered why Fleming didn’t include it. It comes down to the type of text – Fleming took on 10 girls who had limited knowledge and let us know what they experienced and then the effects of their work. Bletchley, as a work of fiction, had more freedom with the facts and how they were woven into the tale.
Do I think Enigma rises above all other books under consideration? Not sure but I believe it’s a strong contender.
ENIGMA GIRLS is my favorite 2024 nonfiction book for middle-grade readers and my choice for the 2025 Robert F. Sibert Informational Book Medal.
Candace Fleming did a masterful job of providing a comprehensive overview of WWII, while highlighting a the story of Enigma work at Bletchley Palace. Organization of personal stories and detailed accounts of the individually tedious but collectively powerful work of the “Wrens” (the female branch of the British Royal Navy during World War II) was appealing because the reader is consistently reminded that most of these contributors were teenagers. I agree with the comments above that the fun stories of teenage pranks were fun to read. The photographs and source materials were so well placed and particularly valuable for young readers because of the ” picture-superiority effect,” the proven mastery of content that pairs images with text. The “Top Secret” sections of the book, printed with a grey background, provided an excellent cryptography background. The history and details of codebreaking also provided context clues- magnifying the complexity of breaking Enigma codes and the genius of their success.
I really enjoyed this book. It was particularly rewarding to read it as a precursor to MAX IN THE HOUSE OF SPIES (Adam Gidwitz) and THE BLETCHLEY RIDDLE (Steve Sheinkin and Ruta Sepetys.) The effect of Fleming’s ENIGMA Girls was so powerful that when Steve Sheinkin inscribed my copy of BR with a cipher this summer, I actually spent DAYS looking at the letters highlighted (first letter of every chapter) thinking that BLETCHLEY RIDDLE had a secret coded message. LOL. News alert: There is no hidden message, and the cipher is just for his inscription.
Going back to the non-fiction discussion post on 9.18 regarding the Newbery criteria and how it relates to non-fiction contenders, based on historical Newbery precedent, non-fiction titles are in an uphill battle against innovative fictional titles. (https://heavymedal.slj.com/2024/09/18/wednesday-roundup-nonfiction-newbery-contenders/)
Out of curiosity, I re-read the Sibert criteria today. The identified age range, like the Newbery, is “children range from birth through age fourteen.” What stood out to me was: “Significant contribution is gauged by how well the work elucidates, clarifies, and enlivens its subject. The committee considers overall accuracy, documentation, organization, visual material, and book design.” There is also the inclusion of ” key elements such as archival images and documents, and other primary source materials… that may enhance their value as elements of informational works.”
I thought about Steve Sheinkin’s incredible MG books FALLOUT and BOMB: The Race to Build—and Steal—the World’s Most Dangerous Weapon (2013 Newbery Honoree. I also thought about ALL THIRTEEN (C. Soontornvat, 2020 Newbery Honoree) and the 2024 HMAC winner, MONA LISA VANISHES (N. Day, 2024 Siebert.) These are some of my favorite books of all time.
As a Young Reviewer and wide reader of history and nonfiction books, I would love to see a modern nonfiction title win the Newbery. While ENIGMA GIRLS certainly deserves to be considered, there are titles in 2024 (novels, poetry) that use language masterfully, hitting the Newbery rubrics more effectively.
Regarding ENIGMA GIRLS, I am excited that it meets all of the Sibert criteria and am rooting for Candace Fleming.
My only addition to all of the excellent points so far, is a personal one. Being utterly right-brained, I enjoyed the biographical and historical parts, but much of the math, inventing and engineering went over my head, and I confess to skipping the “Top Secret,” sections featuring the nitty gritty of codes and ciphers. My full-brained husband, on the other hand, dug into those intricate sections, and they were his favorite parts. There are potential young readers like both of us who will enjoy the book’s small chapters and/or the wiki-how-like ciphering sections. I agree with all of the comments about excellent nonfiction of past years, All Thirteen being my hands-down fave with Mona Lisa close behind. Since we’re only looking at 2024 titles, Enigma Girls doesn’t make my top five of our finalists.
I’m glad you shared your choice to skip the “Top Secret” sections, Elaine. I think that’s a choice some readers will make. Either because the code stuff is kind of hard to grasp for many (including me) or because they’re caught up in the historical story and don’t want the break from it (also me…I read them and tried to understand everything, but cared more about the story).
So how does that work with the Newbery? The criteria tell us to look for excellence in “presentation of information including accuracy, clarity, and organization.” You could argue that including information that will be beyond the comprehension or interest of some readers is a weakness. But you could also say that it’s a strength: Having it in there is relevant to the historical narrative, and likely will enhance that story for those who learn more about the technical side of codebreaking. At the same time, those who are not interested can easily skip it…especially because of the way it’s placed at chapter endings with the gray background.
It seems to me that that’s a particular feature of non-fiction, where including more information at varied levels of depth can work; it’s the author trusting the readers to discern their own levels. In this particular book, the historical narrative is clearly the main content, and the “Top Secret” sections work well as being optional, without being identified as such by the author.
That doesn’t work as well in fiction, I think. Any information about spy craft in MAX IN THE HOUSE OF SPIES or tuberculosis in LIGHT AND AIR needs to be woven into the plot for all readers. More in-depth information that might disrupt the fiction is often put into an Afterword or Author’s Note, which is clearly “optional” reading for most. LIGHT AND AIR does this nicely. That could have been a choice for ENIGMA GIRLS too, moving all of the “Top Secret” facts to a separate spot at the end, but I like Fleming’s decision to mix it in with the story of the girls and the progression of the war.
THE ENIGMA GIRLS deserves to be on the Mock Newbery list for its presentation of information and its appropriateness of style. I agree this book was hard to put down. I liked the Top Secret sections that explained how ciphers work – and it felt like teachable moments for middle schoolers reading this. I appreciated the pictures that showed actual images of the TypeX, Abwehr Enigma, the checking machines and the Bombe to give readers a sense of what these items looked like. These images, along with the poster of the Wren, the Secrecy document, and other images of wartime life really brought this book to life as well.
Fleming did a phenomenal job of capturing each teen and giving them a voice. I felt like you learned a slice of life from each teen – what they were facing and how they lived regardless of wartime. I was impressed by their secrecy. How it must have felt to not only leave your family and conduct this work – but not say anything? Or when the Bismark was attacked and Mavis was wrestling with her feelings about what happened. “How awful it was that one’s breaking of a cipher could send so many people to the bottom.” (pgs. 119-120). It showed that while the teens believed in their work, their feelings about war and death were there – and it makes them human. Julie mentioned in her post why 10 teens? I think if the book focused on more than 10 teens, it would be too long.
I have just finished reading this text for the third time (twice in audio, once in print) and I really believe that this book is one the most distinguished of the year for a few reasons. I will try to outline my thinking here without simply repeating what others have said.
1. Presentation of Information including accuracy, clarity and detail: As I read this again, I couldn’t help but try to visualize what it looked like when Fleming was outlining this text, plugging in the information in exactly right spots. She has masterfully layered in background information in the perfect moments to build the background for the story telling. As Steve mentioned, the addition of the Top Secret sections adds another level of information for curious readers. Although I also skipped this as well, some readers will not and by making this not crucial for the storyline, allows readers a more organic information gathering experience.
2. Delineation of Setting: “Poland was stretching awake on that first day of September 1939. Golden sunlight spread over fields of ripening corn and villages of straw-thatched log houses. Suddenly, the pink horizon grew dark with airplanes – one thousand of them (p. 3).” This is just one of many examples of Fleming using artful, sometimes figurative but always descriptive, language to set the seen for the reader. The setting that she is careful to describe helps establish how secretive this project was, how crucial the work was, and yet how “normal” the lives of these women were. To me, her description of the setting and how it interacts with the story, sets this apart from others on our list.
3. Delineation of character: One of Fleming’s primary goals is to highlight the work of women whose efforts were unknown until recently. She does this by carefully introducing to each one in more of a metered way than as a group and carrying their story through the narrative. Through details about their lives from billeting horror stories and hijinks with friends to moving stories about their personal lives and their contributions to the war effort, readers get fully fledged pictures of each of these women. Because up until now, there work was secretive, I think it was even more purposeful on Fleming’s part to make them feel so real.
I certainly that this is a strong contender for the Seibert, but I am hopeful that remarkable text gets consideration from the Newbery committee as well.
I’d be shocked if THE ENIGMA GIRLS didn’t get some Sibert recognition, but I think it deserves a shot at the Newbery as well. Fleming introduces her characters carefully, one by one, so the reader gets to know each girl/woman (they were so young!) and their role; this allows a better understanding of the big picture of how Bletchley worked, even though most of the people working there only knew their own part of it.
I loved the TOP SECRET sections between chapters; I actually went through them with my 9yo (who is very into codes) and we worked them out together. I agree with what others have said: some readers will skip these sections and that’s fine, the narrative doesn’t suffer without them, but others will be really engaged by getting a chance to practice the codebreaking/deciphering skills described in the book.
There’s also the element of women’s war work being undervalued or unrecognized – in this case, at least, because of the Official Secrets Act. I’m so glad that the women were able to tell their stories after so many years of silence, and grateful we have a chance to read about them now.
I wholeheartedly agree here, Jenny. I hope that Enigma girls gets some recognition from both committees. Richly deserved!