Surprise! We’re changing up our FRI-YA review collection with one of our fan favorites:
The Ones That Got Away!
Laura Fineberg Cooper, who blogs at Writers’ Rumpus was a Round 1 judge in the YA Fiction category; and Sarah Miller, who writes the Can We Read? newsletter at Substack, was a Round 1 judge in Poetry.
Summaries excerpted from Goodreads.
Click the book cover to read the full summary, other reviews, and add the title to your TBR.
YOUNG ADULT FICTION
Sam Sakamoto doesn't have space in her life for dreams. With the recent death of her mother, Sam's focus is the farm, which her family will lose if they can't make one last payment. There's no time for her secret and unrealistic hope of becoming a photographer, no matter how skilled she's become. But Sam doesn't know that an even bigger threat looms on the horizon.
The attack on Pearl Harbor gives those who already harbor prejudice another excuse to hate. As Sam's family wrestles with intensifying discrimination and even violence, Sam forges a new and unexpected friendship with her neighbor Hiro Tanaka. When he offers Sam a way to resume her photography, she realizes she can document the bigotry around her -- if she’s willing to take the risk.
Laura – The sensitive, elegant narration of 16-year-old Sam (Samantha) Sakamoto, who observes life on Linley Island with a keen photographer‘s eye, and the horrifying treatment of the Japanese Americans so heartbreakingly revealed, make this WWI-era historical novel one I will never forget. I stayed up way past my bedtime feverishly turning pages, increasingly worried about Sam, her family, and her Japantown neighbors as bullies turn into racist thugs, emboldened by the U.S. Government’s declaration that all Japanese are enemies, regardless of whether they were born in the United States or not. Deeply intimate and poignant, this historical novel is based upon debut author Emily Inouye Huey’s family history.
Since her mother’s death, Madeline “Gwen” Hathaway has been determined that nothing in her life will change ever again. That’s why she keeps extensive lists in journals, has had only one friend since childhood, and looks forward to the monotony of working the ren faire circuit with her father. Until she arrives at her mother’s favourite end-of-tour stop to find the faire is under new management and completely changed.
Agreeing to be the Princess of the Faire for the sone of the new owners messes up her plans even more. Now Maddie is overseeing a faire dramatically changed from what her mother loved and going on road trips vastly different from the routine she used to rely on. Worst of all, she’s kind of having fun.
Laura – Madeline Hathaway travels from Ren Faire to Ren Faire with her dad and does online schoolwork whenever the mood strikes – but tallying up experiences in her journal is a crutch to help her deal with her mother’s loss a year earlier. Madeline’s grief is palpable, as is her poor body image from being a plus-size teen and having limited interaction with teens her age. Setting up their tent in the Stormsworth Ren Faire in Oklahoma, the last faire her mother attended before she died, is supposed to be a solemn trip down memory lane. But new ownership brings huge (and humorous) changes, notably being wrangled by goofy, effervescent Arthur into being Princess Gwen for the summer season. Fun? Check! Body positivity? Check! Grief? Check! Awkward first romance? Check! Check!
Ballet is Aisha’s life. So when she’s denied yet another lead at her elite academy because she doesn’t “look” the part, she knows something has to change–the constant discrimination is harming her mental health. Switching to her best friend Neil’s art school seems like the perfect plan at first.
But she soon discovers racism and bullying are entrenched in the ballet program here, too, and there’s a new, troubling distance between her and Neil. And as past traumas surface, pressure from friends and family, a new romance, and questions about her dance career threaten to overwhelm her. There’s no choreography to follow–for high school or for healing. Aisha will have to find the strength within herself–and place her trust in others–to make her next move.
Laura -16-year-old Aisha is an incredibly talented ballet dancer whose dark skin keeps her from getting the opportunities she deserves at her elite Canadian ballet academy. She thought the switch to a public school for the arts would be different. But they’re not. So much is happening that Aisha has dissociative episodes that recall past trauma. Her connection with Ollie, who experienced trauma of his own, provides a balm to her soul. Opening yourself up, trusting others, and letting go of perfectionist expectations is scary for any performance artist, but what Aisha must do to heal. The characters in this book are so raw and real, they will pirouette off the pages and into your heart.
Poetry – Novel In Verse
This YA biography-in-verse of six important Black Americans from different eras, including Ona Judge, Frederick Douglass, Harriet Tubman, Ida B. Wells, Martin Luther King Jr., and Barack Obama, chronicles the diverse ways each fought racism and shows how much—and how little—has changed for Black Americans since our country’s founding.
Sarah – A Long Time Coming is an incredibly well-done and powerful read. None of the people Shepard wrote about — Ona Judge, Frederick Douglass, Harriet Tubman, Ida B. Wells, Martin Luther King Jr., and Barack Obama — were new to me, but he managed to take their stories, weave them into powerful nonfiction in verse, and reveal their lives to me anew in a way that was so moving, I cried. Highly recommend.