Paper Wishes

Reviewed by: Mary Lehmer - Freeport Community Library, Freeport, Southern Maine Library District

Review Date: February 10, 2016

Review

Manami is a young Japanese girl living in the United States in the 1940s. When war breaks out with Japan, she and her family are forced to relocate to one of the internment camps set up by the government for Japanese citizens. In doing this, families were forced to leave and often lose their homes as well as leave loved pets behind. Manami has to leave her dog behind and is devastated. She is desperate to find a way to have him join her at the camp so she releases letters into the wind hoping he will see them and know to come find her. This is a sad but honest portrayal of how Japanese Americans were betrayed by their own government during WWII. The sadness and problems the internment camps caused is simply laid out and lets the reader visualize and imagine just how horrible it was. It also is a great look at how punishing a whole group of people for something others of the same race or religion has done is so unjust, a very timely topic for the times.

Overall Book Score: excellent