We are delighted to welcome Sue Klauber, author of Zinc and Cobalt, to the Time Tunnellers. Here is a fascinating insight into what being a secret agent in WW2 involved – and for all of this, Sue is drawing on her own family history. We feel this is going to become a Time Tunnellers Classic!
About the author
Sue Klauber is an author of upper middle-grade/YA historical novels Zinc and Cobalt, published by Troika Books. She is also an experienced fundraiser and former media educator. She has produced films made by refugee children from Colombia, Kurdistan, Kosova, Afghanistan, Eritrea, Iran, Armenia and Romania, worked as a fundraiser in arts and social care charities and is now the Trusts and Foundations Lead for Jewish Care where she raises grants across the areas of residential care, disability and Holocaust survivors’ services.
Zinc is a fictionalised account of the kinds of things that might have happened to her father (called John), his brother George, and their sister Eva, during the Second World War. John was a code breaker, George was a secret agent, and Eva was involved with the resistance in Hungary. They never told anyone about what they did, due to the Official Secrets Act; Sue only found out after their deaths, and wrote the book based on her research into their roles.
Cobalt is the sequel, as when Zinc ends John, George and Eva still need to continue to fight to overthrow fascism and protect their Jewish family in any way that they can. John is sent by the code breakers at Bletchley Park to the Sahara desert, which did indeed happen to Sue’s dad, the real John. George goes on another mission, and Eva is finding ways to resist, even though she is still trapped in Hungary. John and George recall an incident from when they were children, which they must come to terms with to repair their relationship and restore their self belief.
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