2020 Contenders: A Place to Belong by Cynthia Kadohata

Hanako's family spent four years in U.S. internment camps during World War II, and now they are leaving America for Japan. They will live with Hanako's paternal grandparents on a farm outside of Hiroshima. Arriving in Japan, Hanako and her family are appalled at the devastation wrought by the atomic bomb that the United States dropped on the city. At her grandparents' house Hanako is surrounded with love, but the family is very poor, and food is a constant concern. Hanako's parents and grandparents also wonder what will happen to Hanako and her younger brother Akira. In the United States, they didn't have much money, but they had options to better their lives. In Japan, they will most likely become tenant farmers, like their grandparents and many generations before them. But Hanako and Akira are still American citizens, and though their parents renounced their citizenship, there is a chance that they can get it back. Should the family try to return to America, even if that means starting over with nothing?

In this gentle book, it's the characters who really shine. Hanako's Jiichan (grandfather) and Baachan (grandmother) are the sweetest little old people ever, and I just wanted to give both of them a hug. But each member of Hanako's family is nuanced and complex, grappling with big questions. Hanako herself deals with fitting into a different culture, as one might expect from the book description, but she also struggles with her impulse to be compassionate, balanced with her own family's privations. Should she give food to a bomb-scarred war orphan? What if it means that her own little brother will go hungry that night? This concentration on emotions and morality necessitates an inward focus, so there's not a lot of action in the book's plot. In some ways, this is an ur-Newbery book: deeply contemplative historical fiction with a female protagonist, with strong character development at the expense of plot. I'm not trying to denigrate the book; just saying that it follows a venerable tradition of strong, well-written Newbery contenders.

I don't think this book is well-served by either its nondescript title or its bland brown and yellow cover, but of course, neither of those factors has any bearing on its Newbery eligibility. A Place to Belong received starred reviews from Kirkus, Publishers Weekly, School Library Journal, and Booklist, and though it's up against strong competition for the Newbery, I think it has at least earned a spot at the discussion table.

Published in May by Atheneum Books