Daughter of Moloka’i

In this emotional, gripping sequel to Brennert’s Moloka’i, Ruth Utagawa, daughter of lepers but not afflicted herself, is taken from an orphanage and adopted by a Japanese family, the Watanabes, who move from Hawaii to Northern California, where they start a strawberry farm in the early 1920s. In Florin, near Sacramento, they encounter prejudice in the form of Sheriff Dreesen, who wishes the Japanese would all move back to their homeland. Ruth comes of age during the Great Depression; she falls in love with a young man named Frank Harada, and together they open a popular diner. Then the Japanese attack Pearl Harbor and, in the wake of FDR’s Executive Order #9066, Ruth and her family are forcibly relocated to the internment camp at Manzanar, where they undergo a daily struggle for survival. At war’s end, Ruth and her fellow internees must begin the equally difficult task of picking up their lives and starting anew. Then, Ruth receives a letter from her birth mother, Rachel. Their reunion forms the third act of this deeply moving novel. In Brennert’s skilled hands, Ruth’s story is powerful and urgent. 75,000-copy announced first printing. (Feb.)