Honest, poignant letters between two 12-year-old pen pals--one Kentucky born and raised, the other born in India and living in New York's Chinatown--demonstrate that the most important things in life are common among us all.
Meena left behind her home in the mountains of Mussorie, India, and her beloved grandmother Dadi to come to Manhattan. Now her father lives apart from the family to earn money in a restaurant, and comes home one weekend a month. River takes long daily walks with Mawmaw, his Cherokee grandmother, in the mountains of Kentucky. Like Meena, his father also had to take work away from home after the mines shut down, and he gets home infrequently. Meena and River discover other similarities. They both enjoy writing, they both love dogs, their grandmothers both grow okra in their gardens. River asks Meena what the red dot on an Indian woman's forehead (bindi) signifies (it "marks a place of wisdom"). Meena asks River if his freckles feel like bumps. They also discuss serious matters, such as the coal mining company's "mountaintop removal" near River's home, and Meena confides to River the racism she encounters in a post-9/11 world.
By sharing the details of their lives, Meena and River enlighten one another about misconceptions they'd had, and start to see each other as more similar than different. Their honesty creates an intimacy between them, and also shows young people how to ask somewhat prickly questions while conveying the underlying place of friendship from which it springs. --Jennifer M. Brown, children's editor, Shelf Awareness