The Yokota Officer’s Club

In this semi-autobiographical novel, author Sarah Bird (Virgin of the Rodeo) gives us shy, bookish Bernie Root, an 18-year-old military brat visiting her family in Okinawa after her first year of college in the States. Life in the Root household was never exactly peachy-keen, but it’s gotten considerably more bizarre since Bernie went away, and secrets that have been buried for years are beginning to resurface. While you don’t have to be in the military to love this book, I’m sure it wouldn’t hurt; and while you don’t have to be a Texan to love Bird’s narrative voice, her crisp, hilarious and deceptively casual style made me long for home. It’s rare that I burst out laughing and get all misty-eyed while reading the same book. I couldn’t stop myself from reading passages out loud to my fiancé.