Wings to Soar

In 1972, after the president of Uganda exiles people of Indian descent, 10-year-old Viva, her sister, and their mother take refuge at Royal Air Force Greenham camp in England. There, Viva yearns for her father, who remains in Kampala, Uganda. As she acclimates to her new surroundings, Viva embraces the meaning behind her name (“It means/ alive,/ spirited,/ living life”), seeks solace in her love of words and Diana Ross, and befriends two British siblings and an airman. Through Viva’s first-person narration, rendered in engaging verse, Athaide (Orange for the Sunsets) deftly portrays how the protagonist copes with the torpor and anxiety of life in the camp. When the family leaves the base for London with a sponsor, the author steadily seeds intensity, tension, and fear throughout via Viva’s feelings of alienation and her encounters with racism and xenophobia. Intermittent b&w photographs provide historical context, while Viva’s affinity for language adds humor and further learning opportunities throughout, as when she defines collywobbles (“stomach pain or queasiness”) mid-stanza. The quirky cast, combined with this underexplored time period informed by the author’s family history, are engaging, and the narrator herself proves especially memorable. Ages 10–up. (July)