So Far From the Bamboo Grove by Yoko Kawashima Watkins

This story is about a young Japanese girl living in northern Korea during the Japanese occupation of Korea. I read this book after reading A Year of Impossible Goodbyes and I think it made it that much more interesting for me. I already had all the ideas of what it was going to be about and it was not what I was expecting at all. I still did not know much about the history of these events so I thought it was interesting to learn more about it and also to have another perspective. In reading A Year of Impossible Goodbyes it seemed that the Japanese had it very easy. However, in this book it shows that that was not the case. I really enjoyed the pace of this book because I found it hard to put down, I wanted to keep reading to see what happened to Yoko and her family. I also felt this was very emotional to read because it seemed that the characters had horrible situations to deal with over and over again. The fact that this story is based off of true stories made it even more unbelievable because I can't imagine being eleven and going through all of these things and being forced to grown up so quickly.

At the beginning of the book there is a letter from the author telling why she chose to write this book and I thought that was a great addition to the book. I think it helped me get into the story even more because she said she was writing to tell her own life experiences. Through the entire book I kept thinking how awful it was that people actually had to go through this and the fact that she survived creates an even more amazing story. As I said with the other book, I think this book would be great in the classroom. It would be great by itself but by pairing the two together I think it really creates amazing discussion and also helps students understand that stories have multiple perspectives.