Ruth Freeman Swain

This is a charming epistolary middle-grade novel about a girl recently arrived in America with her family from Congo, where her father was persecuted for some slight to the government. Her letters to her Oma are filled with details about her new life, including the titular "one good thing about America today," and for a 10-year-old girl, these can range from ice cream and pizza to her first snowfall to the thought of a new apartment that will allow her and her mother and brother to settle more securely than the shelter where they live. Unlike other novels I've read about the African emigrant experience, ones that are by and about adults, this is a feel-good story in which, aside from other children who make fun of her accent and her difficult French name (Anais) and generally give her a hard time at first, most of the people she encounters are working to help her. The author has a history as an ELA teacher, so unsurprisingly, one of the most important people in Anais' new life is her ELA teacher. Anais' letters also include repeated entreaties to her grandmother, asking whether she has heard from her father and older brother, who are in hiding, and seemingly in constant danger. It is a subtle yet powerful way to fill out the story. Anais' primary preoccupation is with adjusting to her new life, but she is clearly attached to her family and her community in Africa, and the narrative illustrates that dichotomy with wonderful simplicity. This is a lovely, accessible immigrant story for readers young and old.… (mehr)