The author tells this moving story of a young German girl, Emma, who helps to organize her family to leave Solotoye, Russia for Ellis, Kansas. Nine people left Russia for this foreign land but Emma and her family were not destined to go. The story unravels with emotion surrounding Emma's feelings of separation and a constant hope of going to America. The author uses a poetic style to create his story. He also uses letters and poetry to help the reader visualize what life was like living in America and the Russian village of Solotoye. It is an unforgettable, well-written story that I thoroughly enjoyed.

What a fantastic opportunity to share a piece of history -- native Germans relocated to the banks of the Volga by the Russian government. However, though attempting a creative approach, the author clearly missed the mark. He couldn't decide if he wanted to express himself in poetry or prose. Given that the poetry was that of the "speaker', it was neither sophisticated nor compelling, and broke up the rhythm of the novel. The prose, with rare exception, wasn't much better...choppy sentence structure, disjointed ideas. More could have been done with the characters while fleshing out the historical backdrop, which was of great interest. My group, so very excited at having won copies of this novel, was most disappointed in the reading experience.

Our group was in total agreement that the book lacked the finished quality we expected. The story had the potential to be an incredible book,but amateur experience kept it from that. The information I found as the leader of our discussion opened up a period of history I had never heard of before.