Culture, games, and war

Endgame: The Secret Force 136
by Catherine Little (illustrated by Sean Huang)

Oakville: Plumleaf Press, 2023
$22.95 / 9781738898244

Reach for the Sky: How Two Brothers Built an Airplane in Chinatown
by Evelyn Sue Wong (illustrated by Sarah Ang)

Oakville: Plumleaf Press, 2025
$22.95 / 9781738898244

Reviewed by Alison Acheson

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Catherine Little’s EndGame: The Secret Force 136 does what a good picture book should: it tells a story in layers, layers that work together to one end even as they keep the reader intrigued and growing with each read.

Illustrator Sean Huang and the book’s designer have made exemplary use of visual modes, using varied colour palettes, formatting, and fonts to create a sense of contemporary gaming, while evoking the relationship of a young boy and his great-grandfather and the realities of a very old game, “elephant chess” as it’s called, or Xiangqi. 

The illustration of the game-board—which, unlike the familiar chess board, includes a river and diagonal lines—is unobtrusively instructive. The facial expressions of the characters capture frustration, growth, understanding, openness, familial care. The final illustration of the great-grandfather is a joy—the look of a man who has taught a lesson so well that he is overtaken by the young in his own game! 

The portrayal of hands is rich, too; even to share this thought with young readers, to ask how they experience “hands” in these pages, could lead to classroom discussion. The illustrated hands carry the ideas of age, and generational sharing.

Also, for classroom discussion: the realities of war and the “play” of gaming. Again, for the images of wartime reality, the colours and images shift; the demarcations between years past, current day, and gaming, leave the reader with the boundaries we need in order to have such discussion.

The story opens on the tenth birthday of the main character—the double-digits celebration! A wonderful choice as it opens picture book reading for older children. It’s also a perfect time to learn about “planning ahead,” central to this story, and its emotional underpinnings, apart from the game and real-life layers.

The great-grandfather shares the war years and his own signing up for Secret Force 136, a path for Chinese Canadians to go overseas. He speaks to the challenge of learning to swim given that as a child and young person he was not allowed to go to public swimming pools—such were the laws at the time.

This story talks about sacrifice, and stepping out—taking the first step—to make a difference. Water is a constant in the story, with that river of the game, the mentions of crossing it, the swimming, the thinking ahead. If the powers-that-be had opened the public swimming pools (and hearts) to Chinese Canadians, this would have been a very different story.

The child protagonist says, “I was impatient and focused on winning.” And the great-grandfather replies, “Always remember, someone has to cross the river first.” Along with the advice to slow down, and to plan ahead, there’s a call here: to be the first to cross.

Back pages have photographs and contextual material about the discrimination that worked insidiously prior to the war years, and the impact of the Chinese Canadian war effort.

This is Little’s fourth book with Plumleaf Press, and her works include a story of the Chinese zodiac, another of Jane Austen’s sister, and more, each an imaginative and educational work with downloadable activities on the publisher’s site.

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Reach For the Sky: How Two Brothers Built an Airplane in Chinatown, by Evelyn Sue Wong, illustrated by Sarah Ang, shares the full extension of a passion that started with building model airplanes in the 1930s, and ended with engineering and serving as test pilots for the British Commonwealth Air Training Plan. The brothers, Robert and Tommy Wong, trained over 8000 pilots. 

In the beginning, though, was the model-building: “It took the whole weekend / And ended with a broken wing / But they loved every minute.” There is magic in those words.

Such focus, such dedication! The story is set in Vancouver, with Sarah Ang‘s double-page spread of a map, on which I can find my own home! It brings both the era and the city’s Chinatown to life for the young reader, as does the back page material which, like Endgame, is rich with archive photographs and author’s note. 

The endpapers, from the beginning of the book to the end, are particularly beautiful. With them, Wong (Just a Little Mynah) adds the background of the family journey, east to west on ship and rail, with memorabilia, and even old journal pages in which speaking of the weather is all about the fly-ability.

This adds another layer to the story, a story that can be shared with any grade level in elementary school as the questions and explorations of the text can age accordingly. There are so many opportunities for learners to enjoy and ponder their own passions, and what the world might both offer and ask of them.

This story’s path is more straightforward than Endgame. It is, after all, nonfiction, with the added piece in the end that the author is the daughter of one of the brothers. Suddenly the read becomes more than historical tribute; it is infused with familial love and honour. Even that could add a piece in the classroom: learners can begin their own project about a family member and sharing. Another book with meaningful classroom potential.

These Plumleaf Press titles add value to Canadian literature for young readers, their classrooms, and libraries—both at home and in the community.

Alison Acheson is the author of almost a dozen books for all ages, including a memoir of caregiving, Dance Me to the End: Ten Months and Ten Days with ALS (TouchWood, 2019). She writes a newsletter on Substack, The Unschool for Writers, and lives on the East Side of Vancouver. [Editor’s note: Alison has reviewed books by Lorna Shultz Nicholson, Pam Withers, Becky Citra, Paul Yee, Leslie Gentile, Caroline Lavoie, Janice Lynn Mather, Li Charmaine Anne, Linda Demeulemeester, Hanako Masutani, Julie Lawson, George M. Johnson, Janice Lynn Mather, Jacqueline Firkins, Barbara Nickel, and Caroline Adderson for BCR; Blue Hours, her recent novel, was reviewed by Trish Bowering.]

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The British Columbia Review

Interim Editors: Trevor Marc Hughes (non-fiction), Brett Josef Grubisic (fiction)
Publisher: Richard Mackie

Formerly The Ormsby Review, The British Columbia Review is an on-line book review and journal service for BC writers and readers. The Advisory Board now consists of Jean Barman, Wade Davis, Robin Fisher, Barry Gough, Hugh Johnston, Kathy Mezei, Patricia Roy, and Graeme Wynn. Provincial Government Patron (since September 2018): Creative BC. Honorary Patron: Yosef Wosk. Scholarly Patron: SFU Graduate Liberal Studies. The British Columbia Review was founded in 2016 by Richard Mackie and Alan Twigg.

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