Asian-American Literature

This children’s picture book is called Baseball Saved Us.   This book takes place on the West Coast during the start of World War II after Japan attacked the United States at Pearl Harbor.  It is about a Japanese-American boy and his experiences in the camp that he and his family were placed in.  His father helps dissolve the tensions between those in the camp by proposing they create a baseball field.  Baseball not only helps the Japanese-Americans survive in the camps, but in the end it also helps the little boy overcome the fact that he is smaller than all the other boys his age. 

            I liked this book because this event was very significant in American history.  The Japanese-Americans were wrongly persecuted, and this book gives a good description of what it was like to be one of them during this time in American history.