Snow Treasure by Marie McSwigan

 In a remote Norwegian village there is a store of gold bullion.  When the Nazi troops arrive, Peter's uncle Victor comes up with a plan that the children will help smuggle the gold from a hidden ice cave to a ship waiting to take it safely beyond the Nazi's reach.  The children load the gold bars on their sleds, pull them out beyond the city limits, and then build snow men which mark the spots where they have burried the gold in the snow.  The children face many harrowing adventures, but succeed in saving the gold.

This is an older historical fiction written on about a 3-4 grade level.  I read it because it it the parent/child book club title for this month.  I had read it before so I was surprised that I hadn't blogged about it before.  It is simplistic and lacks any kind of nuance.  The children are heroic, the Nazi's are easily dupped. There are near misses, but the reader is never in any real doubt that our heros will be successful. I just looked it up and it was orginally published in 1942, so I guess it could arguably be called propaganda. but is has never gone out of print. (196 p.)