Book Review: Grenade

By Alan Gratz 

5 Stars 

Grenade by Alan Gratz is about World War II in Japan. It follows two different characters from two very different countries. Hideki Kaneshiro is a 14-year-old Japanese schoolboy who is drafted into the Blood and Iron Student Corp, which is a platoon of young teenage boys who were to fight the Americans. Both characters are on an island called Okinawa, which is near Japan. The other character is named Ray, who is an 18-year-old American Marine who just landed on Okinawa. Alan Gratz uses very descriptive words to describe each situation. It really helps the reader feel what is going on, and it helps you picture the scene in your head instead of it just being words on a page.

It also shows how truly traumatizing war was, especially to a young soldier, which, unfortunately, many of the Japanese soldiers were, as well as many Americans. Grenade shows the readers truly how brainwashed many of these teenage soldiers were in the Japanese army. By the end of the book, you can really tell how much Hideki has developed as a character. Alan did a very good job of describing the horrors of the battle and how devastating it was to both the American and the Japanese soldiers. But also how devastating and destructive it was to Okinawa and the Okinawans.   

Reviewed by Aiden 

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