Gathering ordinary people's stories about historical occurrences like wars and other disasters has become increasingly common in historical research. These stories contribute to our knowledge of how historical events affect ordinary people, including one of the most vulnerable groups, children. During the three wars in which Finland was involved between 1939 and 1945, thousands of Finnish children were moved to Sweden, and their stories shed light on the broader history of politically motivated population movements, especially those involving the youngest members of society.

As Saffle points out, child transports from Finland to Sweden were surrounded by silence for many years. However, in the 1970s, debates surfaced in the Swedish press regarding the necessity of the transports, and the war children themselves—now adults—began telling their stories openly. Scholarly interest in these transports was virtually nonexistent for a long time, but over the past ten years, large research projects have begun in Sweden and Finland. Saffle's book is the first account of the Finnish war children's stories to be published in English, and it is certainly a welcome contribution. That said, it suffers from a number of deficiencies. In the first place, the methodological approach is not explained in detail. What process was used to select stories? Which stories were chosen, and why were others discarded? Drawing on the scholarship of memory would have added an interesting dimension to the book as well. In addition, some of the facts presented in the book are debatable. As far as we know, there are no conclusive figures about how many children actually remained in Sweden after the war. The Swedish archival material suggests approximately 3,000, but children who were transported privately are not included in this figure. Because there are no records of these children, any estimated number is highly speculative.

The Swedish feminist and Social Democratic politician Alva Myrdal once stated that the children were “a gift from heaven” (10) because of Sweden's declining fertility rate. This is, of course, plausible, but it is unclear whether the Swedish government actually wanted the children to remain. What we do know is that toward the end of the war, the Swedish government allocated a substantial amount of money to repatriate the children, which suggests that there was no intent or great desire on the part of officials to keep them in Sweden. Saffle nevertheless provides a vivid account of the strenuous battles in Swedish courts over whether Finnish children should remain in Sweden and possibly be adopted, or instead be returned to their biological parents. Such battles did indeed take place, and Finnish parents undoubtedly found themselves in a disadvantageous position in these battles.

Transferring children within or outside of a country's borders was not unique to Sweden and Finland at this time. Rather, it was an international phenomenon across the twentieth century, especially during World War II—and a deeply politicized one at that. In Germany, authorities encouraged parents to send their children to the countryside under the pretense that they would be safer there; in fact, evacuations were used as well to mold the children into obedient citizens of the Third Reich. The movement of Finnish children also had political motives, but in a different way: it was intended to strengthen the relationship between Finland and Sweden and to underline alleged Nordic affinities. In short, this book highlights an enterprise that affected many people in both countries, and the accounts by former war children of their experiences could have served as a foundation for a more in-depth, comparative analysis.