Meg is the 12-year-old protagonist and narrator in Rescue. She is originally from Auxonne, a small town near the Swiss border located in what is known as the Forbidden Zone, “a Reserved Zone, meant for future German settlement” (21). She fled Auxonne with her parents to go live with her grandmother in La Perche, a northwestern region in occupied France. Additionally, Meg speaks fluent French, English, and German, which comes in handy during her journey, and she is bicultural:

‘Meggie, are you ready to go?’ Maman called from the back door of the house. She’s French, so it sounds like M’gee when she pronounces my name, but I loved that. Papa is British. In public, he called me Margaret, but when it was only him and me, he called me Daisy, because the French word for the daisy flower is marguerite. I especially loved that (12).

Meg describes herself as follows:

My hair was brownish, without actually being brown, and my eyes changed with the light, or the colors I wore. I hoped that made it harder for people to identify me, or to remember my face. That was important, because I had my father’s courage, and these days, courage mattered most to me (14).