BRIDGE ACROSS THE SKY

Eric Yang's quiet narration of this free-verse story inspired by history contrasts with the harsh situation in which 17-year-old Tai Go finds himself. A Chinese immigrant who is traveling with his father and grandfather, Tai Go is held at Angel Island in 1924, waiting to be interviewed so that he can enter San Francisco. Yang's soft tone represents the outwardly subdued quality of this captive. Yet there is a restrained passion in the poetry that Tai Go creates and in the verses that are carved into walls of the detention center by other anonymous immigrants. Yang's rhythms convey the short-lined verses depicting the starkness in which Tai Go finds himself. Nonetheless, Tai Go finds hope in changing the status quo and in finding friendship and love amid his confinement. S.W. © AudioFile 2024, Portland, Maine [Published: OCTOBER 2024]