This is a true, first hand account of survival by a 14-year old boy soldier trained by Hitler's army to kill or be killed. In the winter of 1944 Hitler was running out of supplies, weapons and men so younger and younger boys were being brought into the war.That's when a young Austrian, Alex Svoboda, and his 8th grade classmates were drafted from school and sent to boot camp on their way to the the frozen Russian Front.
Naive and excited to get into the action, Alex and the boys were quickly relieved of any notion of the adventure, romance and heroics of war. In the deafening roar of battle, with death all around the boys struggle to stay alive another day, another minute.
Captured by the Russians and sent on a POW train to Siberia, Alex is among half of the prisoners who survive. Haunted by the loss of his friends, and faced with the prospect of dying in the Siberian lead mines, Alex makes a desperate escape and attemps to walk home.