Lisa See’s — Dreams of Joy *****

When Joy’s father commits suicide and she learns a secret Aunt May and her mother, Pearl have hidden from her all her life, she leaves Los Angeles and enters China. She hopes to forget her life back in America and find her birth father. Joy is elated by her father’s status and by village life under Mao. After Pearl reaches China in search of her daughter, she finds Joy dazzled by a poor country peasant and nothing she says can convince Joy of her ill fated match.

May and Pearl are characters from Shanghai Girls. Now the tale continues a generation later and is just as riveting.

Laura E. Weymouth’s — The light between worlds *****

While the Hapwell children, Phillippa, Jamie and Evelyn wait for their parents to dash into their London bomb shelter, they are mysteriously whisked away to another world — The Woodlands. But after five years with the Woodland creatures Phillippa and Jamie are desperate to return to their world. The readjustment to their original ages when they are transported home is hard on the three of them. For Evelyn who hardly remembers her previous life, it is the most difficult. Will she be able to cope back in England when she cannot breathe a word of her life in the Woodlands?

Cherie Dimaline’s — The marrow thieves *****

With the world nearly at an end from global warming, First Nation people are hunted for their bone marrow. When the Recruiters discover Mitch and Frenchie’s hideout, Mitch sacrifices himself to allow his younger brother to flee. Fenchie escapes and heads into Northern Canada until he is found by a group of First Nation escapees trying to avoid capture and certain death. But can they avoid the new schools that remind the elders of residential schools where they will be slaughtered for their bone marrow?

Mary Lynn Bracht’s — White Chrysanthemum *****

In 1943 Hana, a haenyeo rushes from Jeju Island’s sea to save her younger sister, Emi from capture by Japanese soldiers. In her place, Hana is kidnapped and sent on a long journey north to become a comfort woman. But before she arrives at the northern brothel to service Japanese soldiers she is raped by her captor, Morimoto.

This is a well written but a difficult read because the story is based on what happened to from 50 000 to 200 000 Korean women during WW11.