Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Recommended Resources FICTION books for teens about underwritten history

John Okada's No-No Boy, about the experience of WWII era Japanese-Americans in internment camps who answered "no" to military enlistment and a loyalty oath.

Snow Falling On Cedars (David Guterson) is another novel that weaves WWII Japanese-American internment and post-war sequelae into the narrative.

German Boy - Wolfgang Samuel

Usually history is written by the winners - this account is interesting because it describes the events seen through the eyes of a young boy on the losing side at the closing stages of WWII and its harrowing aftermath.

Try them out. In most of them, the mystery does not have to get in the way of what can also be read as a comedy of manners. They are not equally good, which is why we made recommendations. Gaudy night, in particular, can also be read as a thoughtful novel about gender equality in 1930s Oxford university. No one even gets killed in that one! But it is hard to understand without the back story of Strong Poison.

History.com has created, and recently updated, a segment on Woodstock:
"Woodstock, the Legendary 1969 Festival, Was Also a Miserable Mud Pit"
link - https://www.history.com/news/woodstock-music-festival-conditions-1969

This brief historical sketch offers context to aid a reader's understanding of any fiction one might encounter on the topic.