Eric Yang's quiet narration of this free-verse story inspired by history contrasts with the harsh situation in which 17-year-old Tai Go finds himself. A Chinese immigrant who is traveling with his father and grandfather, Tai Go is held at Angel Island in 1924, waiting to be interviewed so that he can enter San Francisco. Yang's soft tone represents the outwardly subdued quality of this captive. Yet there is a restrained passion in the poetry that Tai Go creates and in the verses that are carved into walls of the detention center by other anonymous immigrants. Yang's rhythms convey the short-lined verses depicting the starkness in which Tai Go finds himself. Nonetheless, Tai Go finds hope in changing the status quo and in finding friendship and love amid his confinement.
(Verse historical fiction. 14-18)Pub Date: Aug. 27, 2024
Duration: 3 hrs, 45 mins
DD ISBN: 9781668118108
Publisher: Simon & Schuster Audio
Review Posted Online: Jan. 22, 2026
Themes of inheritance, identity, sacrifice, and belonging resonate through three voices.
This multigenerational family story comes to life through an ensemble performance. After high schooler Dawn receives an assignment to interview her grandmother, she begins uncovering a family history that stretches from 19th-century China to Taiwan and then New York. Eunice Wong, Katharine Chin, and Kenneth Lee shift among generations with careful attention to rhythm, pitch, and emotional texture, making the transitions easy to follow. Their performances capture the family's guardedness over its old secretsas well as Dawn's curiosity as a young woman seeking answers. As the layers of the Chin family history emerge, the narrators maintain a strong sense of continuity across time.
Themes of inheritance, identity, sacrifice, and belonging resonate through three voices. (Fiction. 13-18)Pub Date: Sept. 22, 2026
Duration: 11 hrs, 42 mins
DD ISBN: 9780063238039
Publisher: Harper Audio
Review Posted Online: Sept. 1, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2026
Jameson's vocal range turns a found-family pirate romance into a masterful performance.
Joe Jameson's ear for class distinction carries this swashbuckling romance from scene to scene. He gives Captain Sharpe a rolling, theatrical lilt that turns every "Kitten" into a small seduction, while Kit's clipped, overcorrected vowels betray the nobleman underneath his borrowed name. The pirate crew gets careful differentiation, too: distinct voices that stay clear even when several characters converse in the same scene. Kit Davenport flees an arranged marriage and hides his noble identity, landing as the bookkeeper on a ship under Sharpe's command—and only belatedly realizing that they're pirates. Jameson's performance does the real work of the romance, charting Kit's shift from stiff aristocrat to someone looser and freer through breath and pacing alone—letting listeners hear the transformation before the plot confirms it.
Jameson's vocal range turns a found-family pirate romance into a masterful performance. (Historical adventure. 14-18)Pub Date: June 16, 2026
Duration: 10 hrs, 48 mins
DD ISBN: 9781668178690
Publisher: Simon & Schuster Audio
Review Posted Online: Oct. 5, 2026
© Copyright 2026 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
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