Attacked! Pearl Harbor and the Day War Came to America

In this important work, Favreau (Unequal) employs multiple perspectives to render a jaw-dropping account of Pearl Harbor, which President Franklin D. Roosevelt (1882–1945) called “a date that will live in infamy.” Through immediate and urgent firsthand accounts from American, Japanese, and Native Hawaiian citizens and military leaders, the author revisits the “interesting, tragic, and heroic” actions that occurred on Dec. 7, 1941. Sources include Takeo Yoshikawa (1912–1993), a Japanese spy who—while posing as a diplomat, dishwasher, and tourist—mapped out “every military installation on Oahu”; Kazuo Sakamaki (1918–1999), a Japanese mini-sub operator who became the first WWII POW detained in America; a nine-year-old Hawaiian boy whose family farm bordered Pearl Harbor; and Doris Miller (1919–1943), a Black mess hall attendant on the battleship West Virginia, who was awarded the Navy Cross for heroism. Alongside depictions of communal recovery, Favreau’s balanced and nonpartisan narration renders the toll that the tragedy exacted on Native Hawaiians and the racism that Japanese Americans endured in incarceration camps. It’s an extensively researched telling that is artfully conceived and grippingly told. Timelines and source notes conclude. Ages 10–up. Agent: Tanya McKinnon, McKinnon Literary. (Nov.)