The Avion My Uncle Flew

by Cyrus Fisher (Pseudonym), Darwin L. Teilhet, Richard Floethe (Illustrator)

Johnny Littlehorn kicked like a steer when his parents told him he'd spend the summer in a dull little French town instead of on their Wyoming ranch. "What a way to spend a summer," Johnny thought disgustedy. That was before he discovered a pistol hidden in a loaf of bread ... and got on the trail of a fugitive Nazi spy and a stolen fortune!

Genres: Historical Fiction, Childrens, Fiction, Adventure, Mystery, Middle Grade, France

256 pages, Paperback

First published June 1, 1946

About the author

A pseudonym used by Darwin Teilhet

Reviews

[Cheryl · Rating 4 out of 5]

As read from OpenLibrary, I found this surprisingly charming.

It's mostly about the boy, John (Jean when he's in France) as he faces the challenges of growing from a pampered boy to a stronger and wiser young man. He's sort of forced to 'man up' in just a few weeks, as he's left to live with his 'oncle' in a poor village where there are almost no speakers of English, while still recovering from a badly broken leg, without his parents.... and then a thrilling adventure on top of it all!

But the 'German spies' are individuals, not indicated to be representative of Germans in general. Ditto the French, and the Americans for that matter.

The boy does complain how the French language makes no sense (for example, 'the house of the woman' instead of 'the woman's house), but it's obviously meant to be humor, as the reader laughs at (and with) the boy instead of at the French.

I believe the Newbery committee liked the idea of pointing out that war also has an impact on the home front, and that recovery is a challenge in that war isn't actually over when it's dated as such. I believe they also liked all the French vocabulary words, and the bits of French culture and history. Of course they liked the boy's developing maturity, and probably they hoped that young readers would like the humor and the adventure, too.

I think this story would make a terrific movie.

This edition, the 1967 Scholastic, downloaded as scanned, does contain some typos. The most annoying was, sometimes, viola for voila. (They did use the accent marks, but I can't seem to reproduce them here without screwing up the rest of my text.)

[Faye Powell · Rating 5 out of 5]

What a delightful way to learn French! To his dismay, 13-year-old John is sent to the small French village of St. Chamant for the summer with his French uncle, his mother's brother, while his parents are in England. The year is 1946. John, or Jean as he learns he is now to be known, understands no French and has no interest in learning at first, but slowly, almost effortlessly, he begins to pick it up, especially when he makes friends with twins about his age. While his uncle works on building a glider that will hopefully resolve his financial woes, John becomes obsessed with finding a suspected Nazi soldier hiding out in the nearby mountains.

This is a YA-level mystery that kept me completely engaged and charmed while adding quite a bit to my limited French vocabulary. The French is very cleverly woven into the story so that you learn right along with John as he and his friends get in over their heads in a dangerous adventure. This book should be required reading for every beginning student of French for encouragement as well as language learning. It's delightfully entertaining, with a little history of post-WW II France thrown in.

In the author's postscript, we learn that he is the grandson of a French immigrant who came to the US after The Great Wine Blight of 1860. The author whose real name was Darwin L. Teilhet (1904-1964) actually did return to St Chamant, his ancestral home, when he was 21 to build a glider, an event that was declared a legal holiday by the town's mayor.

[Betsy · Rating 5 out of 5]

I shall relay a short story to anyone who cares:

It was in my 5th grade SRA reading class (circa 1971) that I met this wonderful story.

At the time, however, I was pissed. I had finished whatever book I had read, taken the quiz and was ready to move up
to the Brown Section - WHICH, LIKE A ONE TIME WONDER SAVANT, I HAPPEN TO RECALL.

The book that everyone had been raving about was checked out, so I dejectedly picked out another.
AND SO A PATH WAS FORGED IN MY LIFE- the road less traveled.

Honestly, I recall little of the story, but it was good. Taking place in France not long after WWII. An American boy from Wyoming, or Montana?, HAS TO STAY THE SUMMER WITH HIS UNCLE IN FRANCE!! This kid is mad as a hatter about it too. He wants to stay in Wyoming, or Montana? to round up the cattle or something, but his leg had been broken and he needs to recuperate IN FRANCE.

His uncle is French. There is a mystery. Some nazis or ex-nazis get nabbed by little Johnny. There may be a treasure. The French people chatter about in Francais. Little Johnny is a hero. He likes France after all.

The AMAZING part is that THE LAST CHAPTER IN THIS BOOK IS WRITTEN ENTIRELY IN FRENCH!!
AND I COULD READ AND UNDERSTAND IT! Of course if I had been asked to read it aloud, it would have been cause for an international incident, but
I'll be damned if, by the end of this book, I could DISCERN THE FRENCH LINGUA!

Now that's an amazing feat and concept for Mr. Cyrus Fisher (and I heartily applaud him) considering that the book was published in 1946.
Interestingly, the book has recently been rescued from its Out-Of-Print grave. I hope some kids can still be amazed by what they are newly capable of doing by that last chapter....my eleven year old self was amazed as well.(less)

[Julie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Sooooo, another Newbery Honor book crossed off. This was very good. I was torn whether to put this in historical fiction since it is a contemporary novel and the author had personal experiences in the places he set the book. Also, it's set in 1946 and closely tied to post-war history so it *feels* like historical fiction.

My favorite thing about this book is how as John/Jean learns French words, he just continues to insert them into his English for the rest of the book. So he'll say things like "last nuit I slept well" etc.... I took a lot of French in school but even if I hadn't, I think I would have been able to pick up enough to read Jean's entire story in French at the end of the book. Imagine how many kids learned a bunch of French from this book!

[Elsie · Rating 5 out of 5]

Julianne and I read this so many years ago 😊

[Sarah · Rating 4 out of 5]

What a fun book! The story was interesting in post WWII France, but the unique aspect of this book is that it teaches the reader French as it goes along! The main character was challenged by his mother to learn to speak and write French while he stays in her hometown. He reluctantly starts learning words. As he learns a word, the author begins to use that French word in the story, instead of the English word. By the end of the book, the boy, and the reader, have learned enough French words that the entire last chapter is written in French!

[Katherine Szerdy · Rating 5 out of 5]

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Where did all the Nazis go? This incredible YA Newbery winning novel is a semi-autobiographical account tracing the journey of a 13-year-old boy from his home in Montana to his mother’s birthplace in France after WWII. Add a quirky uncle building his own design of an airplane and a malevolent Nazi and his evil cohorts and you have the ingredients for an engaging narrative that shows that though the peace treaties were signed, the war was not over!

[Melissa King]

I was trying to pre-read this but can’t seem to motivate myself to pick it up to get through it. Eh, I’ll just drop it. My kid can read it if he wants but I won’t require it. I didn’t see anything objectionable, but didn’t see anything worthwhile either.

[Clayton Hashley · Rating 4 out of 5]

Another great YA historical fiction! This story wasn’t as compelling as the Bletchley Riddle, but I thought it was very cool how the reader gets to learn French alongside the main character! I’m sure this would be a great middle level classroom book for that reason alone, as the class could all learn French together in an enjoyable way.

[Karen Witzler · Rating 3 out of 5]

Learn French as you read this mystery for 8 - 11 .

[Jenny · Rating 3 out of 5]

I liked this quite a bit. A young boy, John (Jean in France) has injured his leg and is afraid to use it. His mother and father must travel to England and he is to spend a couple of months in France with his uncle. He does not want to go. To help motivate him, his parents promise to buy him a bike with high gears, low gears and medium gears if he can walk two miles by the end of his time in France and to buy him an electric dynamo if he can write his mom a letter in French.

Life in France is pretty eventful. His uncle is building l'avion (an airplane). Meanwhile, Jean is certain there is a German hiding in his mom and uncle's childhood home which was destroyed in the war. No one believes him. Jean spends his time learning French, helping his uncle with his airplane, making friends and trying to prove that there is a German hiding nearby.

What impressed me the most was that the author incorporates French into the text and teaches the reader (through Jean) what the French words mean. Through repetition, you become familiar with the words and at the end of the novel I was able to read what Jean writes to his mother in French. (By no means does this mean that I can now read French or speak French. I know that I tended to pronounce the French words in a Spanish accent and the words you learn are related to the village and people Jean meets as well as his adventures in the village. Still I was impressed with what I did learn.)

Adventure, a bit of culture, a bit of history, and a bit of language all mixed together.

[Jean · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a charming "how I spent my summer vacation" book set in a small mountainous French village just after World War II. Twelve (or 13) year-old John lives on a Wyoming ranch where he has an accident while riding his horse and breaks his leg. It does not heal well. His father comes home from the war but must return to Europe because of a military job he has to complete and takes with him his French wife and John whose leg will be operated on in Paris by an accomplished surgeon. To recover, his parents send him to stay with his Uncle Paul for the summer in the village where his mother and uncle grew up. If he can recover and walk two miles and learn French by the end of the summer, his parents promise him a new bicycle and a fancy light to go with it. And now the adventure begins involving Nazis (with guns which children find and use!) who are still hiding out in the region for nefarious purposes, his uncle who is building a new design for an airplane (a glider, really) of amazing capabilities, the necessity to learn French--all done most adeptly so that the child reading the book learns a great deal too--all except pronunciation--making friends, and learning to walk normally again. And by the end, mission accomplished! There are many likable characters as well as the odious villains who are imminently hateable. At the end, even I could read the primer-like letter John writes in French to his mother: "Jean voit un garcon. Charles est le garcon. 'Bon jour, Charles,' dit Jean Littlehorn." Enjoy!

[Sam · Rating 5 out of 5]

A young American boy, with a French mother, goes to France in the aftermath of World War II to stay with his uncle and recover from surgery on his leg. There's a few sinister characters trying to scam both his family and a neighbouring family out of their ancestral homes, but more importantly, two bets the boy has with his parents. To win a bike with gears, he must be able to walk two miles without crutches and to win an electric dynamo light for the bike, he must learn enough French to write to his mother, in French.

The Book has gradually more and more French words included as Jean learns the language, and at the end is the piece he writes in French for his mother (will it be enough to win him the electric dynamo light? You'll have to read it to find out).

It's very definitely aimed at children and the plot is probably much more exciting to children, but it's a very clever concept. The piece at the end is entirely understandable if you've read the whole book, even if you didn't speak any French at the start. It's very basic, it's quite repetitive, but it is entirely in French, entirely using words he's learned (and taught to the reader) through the story, and I do think that this would be a very good teaching aid.

Fun, relatively easy to read, and the plot, although a bit childish, is still vaguely interesting.

I also quite enjoyed the 'about the author' section at the end.

[Melissa · Rating 4 out of 5]

4 stars. Charming and pleasant mystery set post WWII told from 1st POV by a boy, John/Jean, who is recovering from a near crippling leg injury. It's especially interesting that the narrator doesn't hesitate to relate his brattishness, and he is definitely a brat during the early part of the book. He has to have an operation (doesn't want it!) and has to go to France to stay with his uncle to recover while his parents work in London. He just wants to stay at home in his room and bed back home on the ranch in Montana/Wyoming. He hates France. French is stupid. He is enough of a brat his parents think he is just making things up when he tells of repeated encounters with a mysterious and unpleasant man in a Parisian park. Things look up when does finally get to the village where he's to stay while his uncle works on his avion/glider. The avion and the post WWII history were interesting and the story will even impart a rudimentary bit of French to the reader. I read this for my 2019 Reading Challenge and my Newbery Challenge (Honor Book 1947).

[tanveer ⋆｡✧ · Rating 4 out of 5]

In The Avion My Uncle Flew, young Johnny Littlehorn goes to visit his uncle in France and becomes embroiled in a mystery involving a fugitive spy and a stolen fortune. Written by Cyrus Fisher (a pseudonym of Darwin Teilhet), the children's novel takes readers on a thrilling adventure through post-war Europe as Johnny follows clues and tries to solve the puzzle.

With engaging characters and a fast-paced plot, The Avion My Uncle Flew is sure to captivate young readers and leave them eager for more.

If you're a beginner in learning French and want to expand your vocabulary through context, this book is an excellent choice. It's a great resource for understanding common French words and phrases, and it can also help improve your reading skills.

Plus, the French used in the book is authentic and reliable. Overall, it's also a fantastic resource for anyone looking to start learning French and discovering new words without being overwhelmed.

[Christopher Nilsson · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a book I have owned since high school that I never got around to reading. This isn't the type of book I normally read but I'm glad I did. It was a surprisingly good read. It had interesting characters and a suspenseful plot involving John Littlehorn's summertime vacation in France the year after World War 2 ended. While in France he tries to help his Oncle/Uncle Paul in building an avion glider. The kid in the story is probably my grandparents' age. I especially like how most of it takes place in France and tries to teach people to speak French.
Although the author is a good storyteller I don't think English was his first language. I was a little thrown when 'guerilla' warfare was spelled 'gorilla' like the animal. Regardless it's a good read.
I would definitely recommend it!

[Hannah · Rating 3 out of 5]

What a pleasant surprise! This was far more charming than I anticipated. In short: a whiny American preteen spends his summer in France befriending the locals, hunting down Nazi spies and evolving into an altogether nicer boy. Johnny was a likable narrator (even during his moody phase), and the whole story felt simple and old-fashioned in the best kind of way. Yes, the French lessons got a bit old at times, but never to the point of wearing on my nerves, and I was quite pleased that by the end I (who didn't know a lick of French to begin with) could almost read the entire story Johnny wrote for his mother.

A unique and memorable Newbery. 3.5 stars.

[Alyssa Bohon · Rating 3 out of 5]

An engaging story, and a fun and clever introduction to the French language... I enjoyed this story much more, though, reading on my own than I did reading aloud to the children. The boy-talk conversational style is often repetitive and makes the narrative move too slowly. I constantly found myself skipping redundant words to get a move on. This is not your gem of crafted literary sentences, such as in, say, Lewis's Narnia. But the story, with its basis in real history and place and personality, is still worth reading - and the three pages of straight French narrative at the end make a fun concluding challenge.

[Maggie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Thoroughly enjoyed this tale of an American boy, of about 12 or 13, who goes to France immediately after World War II ended. Johnny or Jean as the French would say, stays with his uncle in a small village. With the help of a French brother and sister, a Nazi plot is discovered.

The story really drew me in. The voice of a young teenager is accurate. I can imagine having the same feelings. I loved the way the uncle described, without a map, where in France they were traveling. He asked Johnny/Jean to look at his hand and imagine it was France. He utilized the fingers, lines and the hand itself to describe locations. Excellent book! I can see why it was a Newberry Honor book.

[Melinda · Rating 4 out of 5]

This author has mastered the voice of a thirteen year old boy. John's (Jean's) hesitations and obstinacy about leaving Wyoming for Europe, his misgivings about staying with an uncle he does not know and his wild imagination all played well into his overall character. I also liked how John used the new French words he has learned as he tells his tale. Since I have studied French, I really enjoyed how these words are peppered throughout the narrative, especially the last few pages. It is a great story, full of action, suspense and fun characters.

[V · Rating 4 out of 5]

It was a nice book. I liked how it reinforced the vocabulary it introduced throughout the book. As someone mentioned in another review, I think a pronunciation guide would’ve been nice. Overall, I think this was a good book. This book is great for a beginner in French to get introduced to the language slowly without feeling overwhelmed. I thought the last couple of chapters were going to be completely in French, not just the very last chapter. This may have been my oversight though. It’s still a very nice book and would make a nice movie.

[Ben · Rating 3 out of 5]

I didn't know I was getting myself into a novel-length French lesson when I started this children's book. While it was smoothly integrated into the story and didn't stop me from enjoying the plot-line entirely, it was a bit overmuch. The story itself fits nicely into the setting and has likeable characters with some good fun for John, his uncle, and friends like Charles and Suzanne. The misadventure with the truffle-hunting pig is memorable.

[Elizabeth · Rating 5 out of 5]

A friend shared about this book and Gloria is learning French now (Rosetta stone and duolingo) so I thought it was the perfect book for right now.
It is a good story with twists and mysteries and teaches you a new language at the same time. Gloria enjoyed it and said she was glad she had been hearing french because it is pronounced so differently from how it is written. Lydia is going to read it too (to further annoy her sister with incorrect pronunciation).

[Anna · Rating 5 out of 5]

A gripping middle grade novel! Written from the perspective of a 12 year old boy, with an injured leg, who greatly needs an attitude adjustment. He is forced to go visit his mother’s family in France just after WWII. He did not want to go at all; but he ended up having a grand time, his leg healed, and he accidentally uncovered a Nazi plot. By the end he was almost a different child. I thoroughly enjoyed it, and learned a good many French words while reading, too!

[Brittany · Rating 4 out of 5]

Truly fun story of a boy with an injured leg who is whisked from the Midwest off to France to stay with relatives while his parents handle business abroad. As this is wartime, there are dangerous Nazis nearby, along with a nasty mayor, and our hobbling hero must learn enough French to make friends and discern those friends from the true and imagined enemies. Loved this book – recommended for elementary/middle grade.

[Meepspeeps · Rating 4 out of 5]

I would give this 5 stars if it weren't for the few negative stereotypes reinforced. Given when it was written, I expected these. It's a wonderful story of post war (WWII) France. It includes enough mystery to appeal to adults and enough child adventures and teen thinking to enjoy perhaps as young as 6 or 7. It includes a rudimentary lesson in the French language.

[Mary L. · Rating 5 out of 5]

You can see how things would really get mixed up if you were trying to communicate in a language that you really didn't understand. Yet John had to do that with his friend Charles. What they did and how they managed to do the unimaginable is what this story is all about. I still don't understand much French but it was a fun read.

[Sharon Zink · Rating 3 out of 5]

It was a pretty good story about catching and dealing with Nazis and collaborators after World War II in France. It started 0ut teaching the narrator as well as the reader some French words. Then it seemed to add some French vocabulary that hadn't been explained, and it tended to be confusing.

[Jordan Carlson · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 stars

Read aloud with my kids! They enjoyed it quite a bit but I did feel like it was slow-ish moving in parts. The story was a little scary sometimes, with an exciting climax. Just post-WWII historical fiction. A fun introduction to some French vocabulary.

[Katy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Not sure how I missed this one when I was a kid, but it was a rollicking good time! An adventure story full of twists and turns, vibrant characters, and hilarious misunderstandings as things get lost in translation. Highly recommend!