Written in poetry, this book tells the forgotten story of the forced relocation of Native Alaskan tribes during WWII. Not many Americans realize that Japanese soldiers invaded American soil, off the coast of Alaska, during WWII. For the native inhabitants of those islands, the invasion began a long ordeal of poor living conditions and discrimination.

Told through the voice of a teenage Aleut girl, the story is informative, compelling, and simultaneously heart-breaking and heart-warming.

I highly recommend this quick read.

This was short and a fast read, but I found it lacking in detail. I wanted more than Hesse gave me as a reader.

It is good book for connecting social study and literature such as World War II, or Native American history. I recommend that before reading book, you can see the map of Alaska islands, or bring picture in your class. it is help for understanding this book very well.

This book is like diary which is written poem, so it is easy to read; children do not get stress to read even ESL learners.

it was a poetry book - sorry, don't do poetry.
Thought it would be about residents of the Aleutian Islands during Japanese occupation during WW2 - it didn't give me that....

. . . our home is a necklace of jewels around the throat of the Bering Sea.

This is our third read-aloud of a Karen Hesse book this year, and each experience has been almost identical: I, the mother, have learned something new, and my girls, the intended audience, have yawned in boredom.

The backs of Ms. Hesse's books claim for “Ages 10-14,” but not one of them has engaged my 10-year-old. And, when I read this line tonight (from page 54), “Always green curtains smothering us,” my 12-year old grumped, “Like this story's smothering us.”

Oh, dear.

These books have not appealed to my preteen daughters, and they have rated each one of them “three stars,” which is basically the kiss of death at my house.

So, to be fair, I'm informing you, as a parent, that we're not having a lot of success with this author.

And, yet. . . I learned a lot here! I had NO idea that the Japanese attacked Alaska's Aleutian Islands in June of 1942, and I had NO idea that the Aleutians were forced to evacuate their homes for three years. Nor did I have any idea how ignored and mistreated they were.

This is an upsetting and informative book. It imparted a lot of information in a mere 156 pages. But, the characters are unformed and the story often feels flat.

So, it was useful to me, and boring to my girls. I will contribute that my 12-year-old looked at me at one point and said, “Mom, the racism in this world is sickening to me,” so this experience wasn't without merit, but it's not as though we've had a shortage of middle grades reads about racism this year.

Yes, the treatment of the Aleutians is pretty soul crushing. I'll leave you with the prose poem in the that really got under my skin:

Prisoners Of War

Somewhere nearby, we hear, is a camp for German prisoners of war.
They are well fed, we hear.
They have cots and blankets, every last one. They have room to stretch their long legs. And good sanitation and an infirmary.
They are provided a clean, safe place to live, a variety of foods, and recreation. They are not expected to contribute in any way to their keep.

We are citizens of the United States, taken from our homes.
We did nothing wrong, and yet we get little to eat and no doctoring, and our toilet is an open trough washing into the creek.

No seats,
Just a run of water flowing in at one end, flushing waste out the other.
The German prisoners and the flies think our
government has devised a very good system.

This is a short read. I actually didn't finish it though I should have, i just had too much going on but I like how it was written.

Very interesting and disturbing story about the fate of the Aleut people living on the Aleutian Islands close to Japan and Russia. They were forced to move to another region of Alaska totally different from their home. They were never allowed to return to some of their villages and many died. Descritions of Alaska are wonderful and very authentic.

4.5 Stars

Aleutian Sparrow is another verse novel from Karen Hesse, similar in style to her Dust Bowl story, Out of the Dust. Starting in June of 1942, just months after the Pearl Harbor attack, Aleutian Sparrow tells the story of how within days of that attack, all the Aleut people were evacuated from their villages and moved to relocation centers, the government fearful of fishing contract disagreements between the Aleut and the Japanese. They are assured the move is only temporary, but detainment carries on into 1945. The story follows this tribe of people as they are repeatedly moved more and more inland, far from the rocky, windswept coastline they call home.

The collective experiences of the Aleut people are centralized in the character of young Vera. Vera is mixed race --- her mother Aleut, her father Caucasian, but the father never returned from sea one day so over the course of her childhood, the "raising" of Vera has had her circulating around various family members. Vera has spent much of the year of 1945 living in Unalaska Village, working as a home aide to elderly couple Alexie and Fekla Golodoff. Once summer comes around, Vera takes off to spend time in her hometown of Kashega, hanging out with best friends Pari (also mixed race) and Alfred.

Japan carried out an air attack on Unalaska Island in June 1942 because they were interested in gaining control of the North Pacific, but they ultimately found the Alaskan climate too challenging. Still, the Aleut people continued to be moved around... Vera and her family sent along with the rest of the community to these various detainment camps. The Aleut, a proud people with rich traditions, now found themselves crammed into canvas tents on rainy terrain, forced to live off bread and fish scraps. The drastic changes in environment, along with poor sanitation, soon led to rampant sickness throughout the tribe, many being plagued with skin boils and lung infections, among other ailments. But for the longest time, the government offered the sick no medical assistance. NONE. After much pleading, when a doctor finally does arrive, he takes in the scene, brushes it off with a "they're not sick, they're just adjusting." and goes back home!

Some of the elders take to telling ancient legends to keep morale up. Vera takes it upon herself to get a job at the hospital in Ketchikan, but even with her connections it is still a slow process getting medical aid back to the camps. Eventually, a news story is done about the poor treatment of the Aleut people. Shortly after, the camps are quick to see donations from newspaper readers who wish to help.

I'm sad to say this is not a part of history I was ever taught in school, so I'm happy to be informed of it now. Tragic as the truth is, Vera's story is a moving one and, if you think about it, still plenty relevant, what with all the discussion back and forth about immigration issues and poorly equipped / run border detainment facilities. It's not an easy read in subject matter, but there is ease in the verse format Hesse does so well. Her way of weaving together sparse but also evocative imagery with so few words is quite the treat for readers of all ages, those new to poetry form or even longtime fans. Prepare to dip into lines such as "the old ways steeped like tea in a cup of hours" or "laughter crackled on winter nights like sugar frosting". Then there's the ones to make you stop and think: "We never thought who we were was so dependent on where we were."

Author Sharon Creech gets a shout out in Hesse's acknowledgements page for "patient and wise council".

Aleutian Sparrow by Karen Hesse provides a window into the emotions of the Aleutian people as they were evicted and displaced from their ancestral homeland. The free verse story is told from the point of view of a young woman. The experiences of the Aleutian people are captured in Karen Hesse's writing. This book provides a great insight into the suffering, confusion, agony, and homesickness of this people. The free verse writing style allowed for a lot of emotion to be expressed on each page. It really allows the reader to try and connect to the situation and everything that took place.

Beautifully worded story about the Aleutians being relocated during WWII. Sparse text but powerful words.

Shortly after Pearl Harbor, the Japanese invaded the Aleutian Islands. The U.S. responded by evacuating all of the inhabitants, moving them to southeast Alaska camps.
This book is free verse entries by a fictional girl who was part of this evacuation and her response to the hardships and conditions encountered. So many died. And, when they could return home, American soldiers had ransacked their homes, stores, churches.
The short entry at the end gives more of the history of this. What is disturbing is that the neighboring POW camp had adequate food, facilities and care. These people were left to scrounge for a living. A quarter of them died from disease.
The book is very fast reading, slow and haunting in contemplation.

This slim volume, written in luminous free verse, tells the story of the Aleutian Evacuation during WW II.

Hesse’s novel follows one young teen, Vera, and her friends and family as they struggle to make sense of what is happening, to survive the hardships and to adapt to a life none had ever imagined. The beauty of the work is that Hesse can convey so much in so few words. Here is one page…

KETCHIKAN CREEK
When Eva returns from Ketchikan, she says
The creek there is like a woman
Dressed in a filmy green gown,
Her lace pockets spilling with leaping salmon.

Despite the hardships, there is room for love and faith. Babies are born and cherished. Christmas is celebrated. Still, the sense of loss is palpable. I will be thinking about this novel and the Aleutian Evacuation for a long time.

I had never heard of this episode in the USA’s history. Shortly after the Japanese attacked Attu Island in June 1942 (an attempt to distract the US Navy away from the South Pacific), the government decided that it would be “best” for the Aleutian natives living on the islands to be evacuated “for their protection.” Nearly 900 Aleuts were removed by the US government from nine villages on six islands and forcibly transported to Southeast Alaska “duration camps.” Most were given little more than an hour to collect their necessary belongings, for a trip to an unknown destination, for an unknown length of time. People used to a subsistence living, were deposited in old canneries, or mining camps, without adequate shelter, sanitation, water, food, medical care or any means to support themselves. While the Japanese left the islands by 1943, the Aleuts were not allowed to return to their homes for three years. The deplorable conditions they endured resulted in epidemics of TB, pneumonia, whooping cough and other disease; over ten percent of them died during internment. Those who did return to the islands found that their homes had been destroyed and/or ransacked … not by the Japanese, but by American military troops.

I learned all the above by doing some research after reading this novel. But I certainly gathered clues and a feeling of the injustice suffered by the Aleuts during this time.