In The Beautiful Country

juvenile fiction

     As Anna, narrator of Jane Kuo's In The Beautiful Country, waits to join her father in America she's excited.  She doesn't understand her mother's need to collect memories.  Isn't their new country going to be her family's happily ever after?

     Um not quite.  Anna and her family, used to a house, must now share a tiny apartment with just one bedroom.  English is a challenge.

"I used to love school,

The place where I was the loudest in class.Now I'm robbed of words.

Suddenly I have nothing to say."

And the other kids are mean.

     Her parents aren't having an easy time either.  They'd sunk the money from the sale of their house and loans from family members into a restaurant.  Only the customer volume isn't what they've been led to expect.  As if that isn't bad enough, they have to replace windows shattered by vandals.

     Anna's parents have begun to tell her that it won't be disgraceful to return to their former home.  But she comprehends what it will be like for her father to go back as a failed businessman, owing money, to a place where he has neither a job nor a home for his family.

     In The Beautiful Country is a touching and engaging novel in verse, an especially good read for the many kids who have made similar journeys.

on a purrrsonal note, I'm now sort of freaking out because there are now so many things I have to do this summer: work dining, get the house organized, volunteer with Upward Bound, do a lot of commuter lounge networking and organizing, arrange with the office of institutional research and assessment for a field experience, volunteer in library and community garden, write the first draft of my first book, bus commute, cook...I DON'T EVEN KNOW HOW TO START!!!  I think I'll need some help from my friends.  (Jules)

She'll figure it out.  (Tobago)

a great big shout out goes out to the friends who will help me figure things out.

Tobago and Jules Hathaway