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In her book House of Hearts, Skyla Arndt cleverly uses naming as a form of allusion and symbolism. This strategy emerges most obviously in names like Oleander and Violet. Arndt’s most often used word, however, is splayed. And after the death of her best friend Emoree Hale, Violet Harper’s grief is the most on display. Violet has “always lived in a black-and-white word, worshipped at the altar of knowledge, and kept [her] heart in a box under lock and key” (225); her bestie was the ray of sunshine to Violet’s own Eeyore mood. Both young women are from trailer park homes, but Em wanted moreRead More →

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In: General Book Reviews, Historical Fiction (YA), Multicultural (YA), Young Adult Book Reviews
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Randy Ribay, an author who writes through the lens of experience as a Filipino, shares tremendous history in his novel Everything We Never Had. Telling his story from multiple perspectives, Ribay provides the reader with insight into the Manong Generation, the Watsonville riots, Stockton’s Little Manila, the Delano grape strike, the Ferdinand Marcos dictatorship, the assassination of Benigno Aquino, Jr., and the rise in anti-Asian hate crimes during the COVID-19 pandemic. The story opens in 1929 when Francisco Maghabol is sixteen years old. Believing in the Land of Opportunity, Francisco comes to the United States from Manila in the Philippines by way of Japan toRead More →