Why Join?

  • Add New Books

  • Write a Review

  • Backpack Reading Lists

  • Monthly Newsletter

Join Now

Up From the Sea

Up From the Sea

Author(s): Leza Lowitz

Location(s): Tōhoku

Genre(s): Fiction, Young Adult

Era(s): March 11, 2011 Tsunami

Location

Content

Running through my ruined town,
pack flapping
winglike
against my back.

Plowing through blocks
strewn with heaps of
refrigeratorsblackboardsbicyclestaxis
bustedpianosshelvedesksstairs
allmixedtogether
in a marshland
grave.

In March 2011, a massive tsunami devastates Japan. Kai, a biracial teen from a coastal village, loses nearly everyone and everything in the storm.

When he’s offered a trip to New York to meet kids whose lives were changed by 9/11, Kai decides to look for his estranged father. Visiting Ground Zero on its tenth anniversary, Kai realizes the only way to make something good come out of the disaster back home is to return there and help rebuild his town.

Heartrending yet hopeful, Leza Lowitz’s novel-in-verse is a story about loss, survival, and starting anew.

Review this Book

To review this book, please

Log in

Book Reviews

Lead Review

A thoughtful novel about life, and how it can change in a split second. Poetry and motion, great read.

Read review