We Are Not Free by Traci Chee

"“All around me, my friends are talking, joking, laughing. Outside is the camp, the barbed wire, the guard towers, the city, the country that hates us. We are not free. But we are not alone.” 

We Are Not Free, is 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.

Fourteen teens who have grown up together in Japantown, San Francisco. Fourteen teens who form a community and a family, as interconnected as they are conflicted. Fourteen teens whose lives are turned upside down when over 100,000 people of Japanese ancestry are removed from their homes and forced into desolate incarceration camps. In a world that seems determined to hate them, these young Nisei must rally together as racism and injustice threaten to pull them apart." (Goodreads.com)

We Are Not Free was a moving historical fiction from the point of view of fourteen Nisei, second-generation Japanese American citizens, who were forced into the incarceration camps during WWII. Fourteen characters might seem overwhelming at first, but Chee does an amazing job at making each voice distinct. They cover a variety of experiences and feelings that many teens had during that time. This is a great resource for teachers and families to talk about this difficult time in our history and to relate it to present day events.

Meghan McCabe

Children & Youth Services Librarian

Available at the Langley-Adams Library