Inside Out & Back Again by Thanhha Lai is one of the 2012 Newbery Award Honor books. (It is a very fast read, for those of you trying to finish your 25 books this year!) It is written in a poetry format. It is a fiction book, but the story line follows the author's own life story pretty closely. In the book, the main character is a young girl growing up in Saigon, during the Vietnam war. She ends up making it out safely with her mother and brothers, to end up living in Alabama. The story lets you feel how difficult it would be to move from one country to another, be the new kid in school, and the first Asian the other children had ever seen. There is a definite bullying theme that runs throughout the book. Read it to find out how the character survives and adapts to her new home.
Reviewed by Mrs. C.
