November 1939: The Soviet Union, the largest army in the world, invades its small, relatively defenseless neighbor Finland, just three months after the declaration of World War II. So began what is known as the Winter War. A makeshift Finnish army of soldiers, workers, and farmers must face off against columns of tanks and almost a million of Stalin's Red Army fighters. In a dramatic and moving narrative based in part on diaries, journals, and accounts of participants, Norek captures the horror and tragedy of war. Soldiers go to battle with a shortage of weapons, and the cold becomes both enemy and friend-causing wounds to freeze and limiting the movement of the invaders. The legendary sniper Simo Häyhä, nicknamed the "White Death," puts terror in the hearts and minds of the Russians. Intense, propulsive, and deeply human, The Winter Warriors is a stunning historical novel of Finnish courage and determination in the face of the Soviet invasion. Jacket flap.
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