Grenade by Alan Gratz

Hi, my name is Deven, and this is my fourth article I am posting on the Illiterete blog site. While wondering the halls of books in the Champaign public library, I received the recommendation of a historical fiction book called Grenade by Alan Gratz. After reading it, I was very glad I listened to this recommendation. Grenade was full of plot twists and turns and never had a dull moment. This article, like my previous ones, will describe the plot, what I enjoyed and what I didn't like about the book.

Plot

Grenade takes place in World War II during the American invasion of Okinawa. The story narrates both sides of the war; one narrator is fighting for America and the other is fighting for Japan. The American soldier, Ray Majors, is a new addition to the marines. He enlisted to proudly fight for his country despite his father's rejection to enlist. Ray's father tried to prevent him from enlisting because he was a World War I veteran who came back having a different personality. Before the war he was kind, gentle, happy, and supportive, after the war, however, he was sad, abusive, bitter, and mentally broken. At Okinawa, the marines were instructed to kill the Japanese soldiers, but not the natives because, as Corporal John Barboza explains, this is a war that is on land that was originally peaceful. As a result, the natives of Okinawa didn’t want to fight. 

The soldier fighting for Japan is a 13-year-old boy named Hideki Kaneshiro, who is an Okinawan native. He was enlisted along with the rest of his class and family. His father was also enlisted as a soldier and his older sister was enlisted as a nurse. Hideki's mother and little brother could not fight nor help wounded soldiers, so they boarded a boat and escaped. Before entering the battlefield, Hideki was given two grenades, one for the enemy, and one for himself. This self-sacrifice fighting was a method Japanese soldiers used during World War II. The theory was to kill as many enemies as possible but kill yourself in the end as a sacrifice for the empire. Horrified but determined, Hideki entered the battlefield. 

Seeing the horrors of the battlefield, Hideki fled. Taking refuge in a cave, he finds his father fatally wounded. He tells Hideki that the boat that took his mother and little brother sank and that he was now tasked with finding his older sister, Kimiko; uniting the remaining family members. Will Hideki find his sister?

When Ray enters the battlefield, his squad is quickly met with a Japanese sniper to which he quickly killed. Seeing death for the first time disturbs him because he wanted to save the native Okinawans more than fight and kill the Japanese. As a result of killing his first soldier, his first person, he slowly falls into an endless abys of self-blame, guilt, and regret. How will he handle these extreme feelings? What will he do as a soldier moving forward? What will happen when these two stories meet? 

What I did like

I loved this book. Both sides of the story were thrilling, entertaining, sad, and hopeful. The battle scenes, reunions, and the small victories that slowly add up to a major victory were all very well written and some scenes were enjoyable while others were heartbreaking. The author also did a good job at showing which character was narrating and their point of view. Then, when the two vastly different characters met, I didn't want to put the book down. The author created many short chapters describing the scene from both viewpoints; to which was very intriguing. The author also does a nice job with character development. He describes not only Ray's back story and explanations of his actions, but also Hideki's lineage and that there is a bigger reason he is fighting instead of merely wanting to kill American soldiers for the Empire. 

What I didn't like

 I thought that this book ended with too many incomplete stories and ideas that could've been resolved if the author put a few more chapters into the book. I also didn’t like how the event timeline; it was very confusing. For example, Hideki blew up a small hideout and escapes into the forest, then in the next chapter where Ray is narrating, he describes some events before the explosion, the explosion, and more of the fight that was happening. 

Overall, I loved this book and if you like war historical fiction, then I would recommend this book to you.