It's not the sort of book that usually draws my attention, but something about it caught my eye. It's a poignant story, short and bittersweet. Though fictional it relates many of the true hardships of the people and time. Being in verse it was a quick read, succinct and poetic. Quite an interesting little window into the time, people, and place.

A beautifully written story told from the eyes of a native Aleutian teen. Adding yet another layer to the horrors of war is the little known fact about the travesties that haunted and scarred the small chain of islands off Alaska's coast called the Aleutians. In 1942, the Aleutian Islands were attacked by Japan. Vera and her family are forced to move to from their land, where they made seal-gut pants, could capture cod with their hands and gather grass for fires and medicine to a dirty, inhospitable camp. In the camp they wait for three long years through death, disease and persecution for the US Government to let them return to the home that bombs and US soldiers have destroyed. I enjoyed the historical relation to the story and appreciated that Hesse told the story in such a beautiful emotive way. I felt the pain and longing of Vera through the poetic language.

This would be a really be a good book to supplement a WWII book club. It is fiction based on factual accounts of the Japanese invasion of Attu and Kiska and the Aleuts who were displaced because of it. Worth the read.

I love the format of this book. So few words tell SO much. To be read and savored one page at a time.

Aleutian Sparrow made very little sense until about halfway through the book. After that point it started getting pretty good, but it was all over the place. One minute the main character (Vera) was watching her best friend die, next she was over the moon because there was a boy who was falling in love with her. But it was an interesting story once it made sense.

My favorite excerpt: "We never thought who we were was so dependent on where we were./But when we settle back into the quiet villages along the Aleutian beaches, who will we be after all of this?"

So many beautiful metaphors: regarding the volcanoes erupting on the islands, "...It is nature/holding a mirror up to the troubles of man." and describing Ketchikan Creek, "The creek there is like a woman/Dressed in a filmy green gown,/Her lace pockets spilling with leaping salmon."

Sad, but well-written fiction book about a little-known event in American history. The Aleutian people were put into internment camps during WW II by their own government and treated very poorly. Many became sick and died. This the story of one young girl who survived and many who didn't.

This book is written in unrhymed verse, and tells the story of Vera, a girl of Aleutian and Caucasian decent, who is relocated from her home during World War II. A mature reader would gain considerable knowledge about the devastation that occurred when these Aleutian Islanders were put in concentration camps in order to “protect” them from the Japanese.

This book is written in poetry form from the view of Vera, a young Aleut girl. It takes place during WWII when the Aleuts were relocated to camps in Alaska. This was because the Japanese invaded the Aleutian islands.It shows some of the stuggles Vera and the other people had to go through during this time. It gives another perspective on WWII, and connects to the reader on an emotional level. It also touches on other issues the Native American groups were facings at the time. I liked that it was written from the view of a girl because I think younger readers can relate more to the character.

American Indians in Children's Literature (great site, would recommend btw) shared a review not too long ago about a different book about Aleutian "resettlement" that they absolutely slammed (and with good reason), and at the bottom of the post there were a number of books included as alternatives to read instead of the book being reviewed. Aleutian Sparrow was on that list. I also have very fond memories of another of Karen Hesse's books from my childhood (Out of the Dust, a gift from my fourth grade teacher), so I figured this would be worth a shot.

Aleutian Sparrow is a novel in verse, told from the perspective of a girl who was "resettled", along with her village and several others, in the far southeast of Alaska after the US government deemed them as being at risk after Japan attacked the far west of the Aleutian islands. Although this was done to protect the Aleuts (or Unangax), the US government did very little at all to ensure that the Aleuts were provided with a safe and healthy alternative. Aleutian Sparrow uses free form poetry to describe the pain and difficulties that the Aleuts would have gone through, how poorly they would have been treated, and how difficult it would ultimately be to even return home. The characters are well written, and the story is told respectfully and with grace.

I would definitely recommend this to anyone looking for a story about the displacement of the Aleuts, to anyone who enjoys novels in verse, or to anyone who has enjoyed anything else from Karen Hesse. Although it is more of a middle grade novel, I would still recommend it for any older audiences as well.

I like this book well enough and think that it would be a good addition to a WWII unit or poetry unit. It would also be a good way to introduce poetry and perspective. Children are more willing to write poetry when they find out that it doesn't always have to rhyme or be a specific length However, in a school setting some background knowledge would I need to provide lots of discussion time for students to work out the complex issues of intolerance, persecution, and feeling of sorry that book evokes. On the positive side this a book that you could read in class in about a week, mabey even less is you read it to the class yourself. I think this would be a great read to do for 10-15 minutes a day.

This is a really short book wrote in poetry form that is really good to show this style of writing and poems. Through out the book it talks about people and distortion by other people and makes kids think about what else we are missing. It is a historicla fiction book, but provides great inofmation that can be taught in a week and be tied to history, writing, geography and reading.