Put this book on “hold” at your local library, or better yet, purchase a copy at your local independent book store since this is likely one you will want to read more than once. Red, White, and Whole by Rajani Larocca won an honor designation for the Newbery Award and a whole string of other honors listed on the website. It deserved every one and then some more.
The tone is set in the first lines of this novel in verse.
“I have two lives.
One that is Indian,
one that is not.
I have two best friends.
One who is Indian,
one who is not.”
The reader gets set up for another middle grade novel about an immigrant learning to fit into two worlds. That part will be there, but there is so much more – all told in lyrical verse. In addition to the usual tension between Rhea wanting to fit in at school but wanting to please her parents, there is her ambition to become a doctor set against her fainting at the sight of blood. Then her mother gets deathly ill and her fear of the sight of blood takes on a new tension.
The author’s note at the end satisfies the reader’s curiosity about whether this story is autobiographical since she portrays Rhea’s feeling so convincingly. To be honest, I have read the Newbery Award winner as well, and I much prefer this one. It’s probably just as well that I don’t qualify for a member of the Newbery committee!