In 1944, nine-year-old Raj is unaware of events outside of his village as he is being kept busy with his two brothers trying to keep up with chores and avoid beatings by his father. His brothers die tragically in a flash flood and he feels very alone. A particularly brutal beating at the hands of his father lands Raj in the hospital of a prison camp. Here he meets David, a boy his own age who is a refugee, one of a group of Jewish exiles now indefinitely detained in Mauritius (the island where the book takes place.). Raj is determined to help David escape and manages to hide him for awhile at home but then they have to go on the lam together. This book is part of the Morning News Tournament of books and I have the fantasy that I can read the rest of these by the time the tournament starts (I've read several already). This book is well written but heartbreaking.
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