I was definitely intrigued by the historical aspect of this that is not often found in YA books, at least not that I’ve noticed. At first the jumping from character to character and going back in time for Taro’s part of the story kept me flipping back to figure out where I was, but I soon understood and was able to dive into the story. I was also lucky that we ended up with a snow day the week I chose to read this, because I got to spend my snow day reading and finishing the story.

There was so much that made me think in this book. Originally I gave it only 4 stars, because I thought it was going to be more about Hiroshima or even get us close into Pearl Harbor and what happened with that. But as I continue to think about what I read, and even discuss it with others, I decided to bump it up to 4.5.

One thing that really stood out to me was that the soldiers/pilots, may still have had girls falling in love with them like even American soldiers do. But the end result for these was so different that it really stuck out to me. You see the kamikaze pilots main goal was to crash and burn. To crash into the enemies boats, planes, whatever, and the goal was not to make it out alive. They were sacrificing everything for their country. So if for some reason they didn’t die, then they were considered disgraced and that they’d dishonored their own names. So how hard would it have been to fall in love with those men, boys at times? Not to mention the women’s own sacrificial mindsets. Strapping their children to their bodies and then drowning them as they committed suicide themselves so that they could meet their husband on the other side after his mission was victorious.

Definitely an eye-opening read, one I plan to promote with students and teachers.

Review first appeared on Lisa Loves Literature.