about the book
Mitsi Kashino and her family are Japanese-Americans, which makes it very difficult for them after Japan attacks Pearl Harbor. People begin to give them funny stares, even mean ones. Then the internment camps get built, and Mitsi, her family, and her fellow Japanese-Americans are taken from their homes.
Worst of all for Mitsi is having to leave behind her beloved dog, Dash. Life as Mitsi knew it is gone, and she may never see Dash again. The camp is crowded. Unfamiliar. There are lines and rules everywhere she must follow. And she and everyone in the camp are fenced in by forbidding barbed wire.
Her only link to her former life comes by way of a friendly neighbor, who writes her letters about how Dash is doing. Those letters help Mitsi hold on to the hope that the hard times will soon be over and life may get back to normal.
about the author
The bossy, oldest child of four, Kirby Larson was raised in the state of Washington. She went to five elementary schools, two junior high schools, and two high schools.
Since she was always the “new kid,” books were her salvation. Teachers complained that she read all the time, but that reading eventually led to her writing career!
As a senior in high school, she argued with a guy named Neil in the library—and four years later she married him! They have two grown children, a son and a daughter. Kirby, Neil, and Winston, their Wonder Dog, make their home in Kenmore, Washington, but spend as much time as they can at a seaside cabin on the Canadian border.
Kirby graduated with a bachelor’s degree in broadcast journalism from Western Washington State College and a master’s in communication education from the University of Washington. She is on the faculty of the Whidbey Writer’s Workshop MFA program. She has given over 200 presentations in schools, libraries, workshops and seminars.
Kirby was inspired to write Duke after she heard about her husband’s uncle, Palmer Bruland. Palmer flew B-24s during WWII and was captured by the Nazis and sent to Stalag Luft I, a prison camp which held 8,939 American, British, Canadian and New Zealand officers. While doing research on Palmer, Kirby ran across articles on how children helped the war effort. She began to wonder how she would feel if she had to volunteer Sam, her dog, to the Dogs for Defense program.
Kirby lives in Kenmore, Washington, near Seattle but spends as much time as she can at the family’s beach house near the Canadian border. You might think it is odd, but for a treat Kirby prefers plain rice to chocolate!
Sources:
Author website
Author biography: Fresh Fiction
Author interview: ALSC Blog
Author interview: Deb Watley
Also by Kirby Larson:
Liberty (Dogs of World War II). Scholastic. October 2016.
Duke (Dogs of World War II). Scholastic. 2013.
Hattie Ever After. Delacorte Books for Young Readers. 2013.
The Friendship Doll. Delacorte. 2011.
Hattie Big Sky. Delacorte. 2006.
Fences Between Us : The Diary of Piper Davis (Dear America). Scholastic. 2001.
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