I admit: I work in a bookstore and had no idea what this book was even about. Although that's true of a lot of books, I suppose. But a customer came in one night with his two daughters, and it was clear that they were pretty voracious readers. I helped them pick out some good books they hadn't read yet, and recommended a few others for the future. Their dad, in turn, recommended this book to me.The summary he provided was pretty good. It's set in WWII Leningrad. A boy gets caught by Soviet soldiers looting the body of a dead German who inexplicably fell from the sky. He and a soldier accused of desertion are taken to "the Colonel," who apparently runs the show where they live. Under normal circumstances, the penalty for either of their crimes would have been summary execution, but the Colonel's daughter is getting married in a week, and she wants a wedding cake. The two boys can escape death if they can round up a dozen eggs by the day before her wedding, so that she can have her cake, and eat it, too.
Unfortunately, finding 12 eggs in besieged Leningrad (or Piter, as the boys call it), is no easy task. The book follows them on their journey to save their own lives.
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