Shanghai Messenger By Cheng, Andrea

Title: Shanghai Messenger

Author: Cheng, Andrea

Illustration: Ed Young

Publisher: Lee and Low Books

Comments

CIP info A free-verse novel about 11 year old Xiao Mei’s vist with her extended family in China, where the Chinese-American girl finds many differences but also the similarities that bind a family together.

I am not sure why but it took me ages to get around to reading this book. Once a reader gets over the layout, the text is great. This is a great message of connection of families. May goes by herself to visit family in China. At first she doesn’t go, but her grandmother asks her to go and be her messenger. She enjoys her trip, and finds it hard to return to America. She becomes the messenger between the family. The reader is drawn into this story and makes the trip with May. This is a great story to share, and a fine example of how poetry doesn’t have to rhyme