Yukie's Island: My Family's World War II Story

A moving picture book autobiography about a family's resilience and path to healing after the devastation of war.

It's 1945, the final year of World War II. Yukie Kimura is eight years old. She lives on a tiny island with a lighthouse in the north of Japan with her family, and she knows that the fighting that once felt so far away is getting closer.

Mornings spent helping her father tend to the lighthouse and adventuring with her brother are replaced by weeks spent inside, waiting. At some point, Yukie knows, they may be bombed.

Then, it happens. One Sunday, bombs are dropped. The war ends soon after that. Everyone tells Yukie there's nothing to be scared of anymore, but she's not so sure. So she watches and she waits--until a miraculous sight finally allows her to be a kid again.

This is the true story of Yukie Kimura told in her own words, co-created with her son, illustrator Kodo Kimura, and co-written with bestselling Newbery Honor author Steve Sheinkin. Yukie's Island is an honest, thoughtful, and stirring picture book about being a child living through wartime.

Author: Yukie Kimura, Kōdo Kimura, Steve Sheinkin
Publisher: Roaring Brook Press
Published: 07/18/2023
Pages: 48
Binding Type: Hardcover
Weight: 0.94lbs
Size: 11.22h x 8.93w x 0.36d
ISBN: 9781250206503
Audience: Ages 9-12


Review Citation(s):
Kirkus Reviews 05/01/2023
School Library Journal 05/01/2023 pg. 98
Booklist 06/01/2023 pg. 72
Bulletin of Ctr for Child Bks 07/01/2023
Publishers Weekly 07/24/2023

About the Author

Steve Sheinkin is the acclaimed author of fast-paced, cinematic nonfiction histories, including Fallout, Undefeated, Born to Fly, The Port Chicago 50, and Bomb. His accolades include a Newbery Honor, three Boston Globe-Horn Book Awards, a Sibert Medal and Honor, and three National Book Award finalist honors. He lives in Saratoga Springs, New York, with his wife and two children.

Kodo Kimura is a painter whose work has been exhibited in museums and galleries in the U.S. and internationally. Born in Hakodate, Hokkaido, Japan, he studied art in Tokyo and now lives in New York. Yukie's Island is his debut picture book.

Yukie Kimura was born in 1937 on a tiny remote island in south Hokkaido called Matsumae Kojima. In 1943, her family moved to Bentenjima, where the events of this picture book take place. Since then, Yukie has become a skilled craftsman and dye artist, raised two boys, and started an herbal garden business with her late husband, Haruo Kimura. She currently lives in Date, Hokkaido, Japan.