Up from the Sea — Leza Lowitz

A powerful novel-in-verse about how one teen boy survives the March 2011 tsunami that devastates his coastal Japanese village.

On that fateful day, Kai loses nearly everyone and everything he cares about. When he's offered a trip to New York to meet kids whose lives were changed by 9/11, Kai realizes he also has a chance to look for his estranged American father. Visiting Ground Zero on its tenth anniversary, Kai learns that the only way to make something good come out of the disaster back home is to return there and help rebuild his town.

Heartrending yet hopeful, Up from the Sea is a story about loss, survival, and starting anew.

Fans of Jame Richards's Three Rivers Rising and teens who read Karen Hesse's Out of the Dust as middle graders will embrace this moving story. An author's note includes numerous sources detailing actual events portrayed in the story.