Bunting, Eve. So Far From the Sea.New York: Clarion Books, 1998. When seven-year-old Laura and her family visit Grandfather's grave at the Manzanar War Relocation Center, the Japanese American child leaves behind a special symbol.

Chee, Traci. We Are Not Free.New York: Clarion Books, 2020.
The collective account of a tight-knit group of young Nisei, second -generation Japanese American citizens, whose lives are irrevocably changed by the mass U.S. incarcerations of World War II.

Dallas, Sandra. Red Berries, White Clouds, Blue Sky.Ann Arbor, MI: Sleeping Bear Press, 2014.
After Pearl Harbor is bombed by the Japanese, twelve-year-old Tomi and her Japanese-American family are split up and forced to leave their California home to live in internment camps in New Mexico and Colorado.

Kadohata, Cynthia. A Place to Belong.City: Athenium, 2019.
At the end of World War II Hanako’s parents renounce their citizenship and move to Japan, a country that Hanako has never known. Life is hard and Hanako feels like she might crack under the pressure. But just because something is broken, doesn’t mean it can’t be fixed.Cracks can make room for gold, her grandfather explains when he tells her about the tradition of kintsukuroi--fixing broken objects with gold lacquer, making them stronger and more beautiful than ever. As she struggles to adjust to find her place in a new world, Hanako will find that the gold can come in many forms, and family may be hers.

Kadohata, Cynthia. Weedflower.City: Publisher, 2009.
Twelve-year-old Sumiko feels her life has been made up of two parts: before Pearl Harbor and after it. The good part and the bad part. Raised on a flower farm in California, Sumiko is used to being the only Japanese girl in her class. Even when the other kids tease her, she always has had her flowers and family to go home to.That all changes after the horrific events of Pearl Harbor. Other Americans start to suspect that all Japanese people are spies for the emperor, even if, like Sumiko, they were born in the United States! Weedflower is the story of the rewards and challenges of a friendship across the racial divide, as well as the based-on-real-life story of how the meeting of Japanese Americans and Native Americans changed the future of both.

Mochizuki, Ken. Beacon Hill Boys.New York: Scholastic Press, 2002.
Like other Japanese American families in the Beacon Hill area of Seattle, 16-year-old Dan Inagaki's parents expect him to be an example of the "model minority." But unlike Dan's older brother, with his 4.0 GPA and Ivy League scholarship, Dan is tired of being called "Oriental" by his teachers, and sick of feeling invisible; Dan's growing self-hatred threatens his struggle to claim an identity. Sharing his anger and confusion are his best friends, Jerry Ito, Eddie Kanagae, and Frank Ishimoto, and together these Beacon Hill Boys fall into a spiral of rebellion that is all too all-American.

Sepahban, Louis. Paper Wishes.New York: Square Fish, Reprint Edition, 2017.
Ten-year-old Manami did not realize how peaceful her family's life on Bainbridge Island was until the day it all changed. It's 1942, after the attack on Pearl Harbor, and Manami and her family are Japanese American, which means that the government says they must leave their home by the sea and join other Japanese Americans at a prison camp in the desert. Manami is sad to go, but even worse is that they are going to have to give her and her grandfather's dog, Yujiin, to a neighbor to take care of. Manami decides to sneak Yujiin under her coat and gets as far as the mainland before she is caught and forced to abandon Yujiin. She and her grandfather are devastated, but Manami clings to the hope that somehow Yujiin will find his way to the camp and make her family whole again. It isn't until she finds a way to let go of her guilt that Manami can reclaim the piece of herself that she left behind and accept all that has happened to her family.

Sugiura, Misa. This Time Will Be Different.New York: Harper Teen, 2020.
Katsuyamas never quit—but seventeen-year-old CJ doesn’t even know where to start. She’s never lived up to her mom’s type A ambition, and she’s perfectly happy just helping her aunt, Hannah, at their family’s flower shop.

She doesn’t buy into Hannah’s romantic ideas about flowers and their hidden meanings, but when it comes to arranging the perfect bouquet, CJ discovers a knack she never knew she had. A skill she might even be proud of. Then her mom decides to sell the shop—to the family who swindled CJ’s grandparents when thousands of Japanese Americans were sent to internment camps during WWII. Soon a rift threatens to splinter CJ’s family, friends, and their entire Northern California community; and for the first time, CJ has found something she wants to fight for.

Uchida, Yoshiko. The Bracelet.New York: Puffin Books, 1996.
Emi and her family are being sent to a place called an internment camp, where all Japanese-Americans must go. The year is 1942. The United States and Japan are at war. Seven-year-old Emi doesn't want to leave her friends, her school, her house; yet as her mother tells her, they have no choice, because they are Japanese-American. For her mother's sake, Emi doesn't say how unhappy she is. But on the first day of camp, when Emi discovers she has lost her heart bracelet, she can't help wanting to cry. "How will I ever remember my best friend?" she asks herself.

Uchida Yoshiko. Journey to Topaz.Berkeley, CA: Heyday, 2015.
Based on Yoshiko Uchida's personal experiences, this is the moving story of one girl's struggle to remain brave during the Japanese internment of World War II. In a bleak and dusty prison camp, eleven-year-old Yuki and her family experience both true friendship and heart-wrenching tragedy. Journey to Topaz explores the consequences of prejudice and the capacities of the human spirit. First published in 1971, this book is now a much loved and widely read classic