Tag: racism

Nina Revoyr — Wingshooters *****

After Michelle’s Japanese mother leaves and returns to the U.S., her father takes her to the States in search of her mother. Soon she is left with her grandparents in a mid-west town where everyone is white. While her disappointment increases with the absence of her father, she discovers the joy of her grandfather’s love. Soon she is sent to school where she endures the bullying and harassment of everyone. When a negro substitute teacher comes to the school, Michelle discovers that although her grandfather is sympathetic to the bruises and black eye she suffers from other students, he is just as racist as the rest of the town. But what happens when he learns of the flaws of his best friend will change Michelle’s life forever.

A powerful and important story that grabbed me from the first page to the last.

Shyam Selvadurai’s — The hungry ghosts *****

When Shivan prepares to return to Colombo to bring his aging grandmother to Canada, memories of his childhood flood back. He remembers how he was the one forced to befriend the greedy and callous matriarch so his widowed mother and sister would not be kicked out of her house. He suffers her beatings and insults because his grandmother despises his mother for marrying a Tamil and producing two half Tamil children.

Set through an era of political hatred towards the Tamil minority (that still persists to day) and grappling with Shivan’s sexual orientation, this is a story wrought with tension on many levels.