THE SAMURAI'S GARDEN BY GAIL TSUKIYAMA

A 20-year-old Chinese painter named Stephen is sent to his family's summer home in a Japanese coastal village to recover from a bout with tuberculosis. Here he is cared for by Matsu, a reticent housekeeper and a master gardener. Over the course of a remarkable year, Stephen learns Matsu's secret and gains not only physical strength, but also profound spiritual insight. Matsu is a samurai of the soul, a man devoted to doing good and finding beauty in a cruel and arbitrary world, and Stephen is a noble student, learning to appreciate Matsu's generous and nurturing way of life and to love Matsu's soul-mate, gentle Sachi, a woman afflicted with leprosy. 

LONE SURVIVOR BY MARCUS LUTTRELL

At the beginning of the book, Marcus Luttrell describes his childhood and his training to prepare for the Navy SEALs with Billy Shelton. After joining the U.S. Navy and completing SEAL training, Luttrell describes his posting in Afghanistan, in the Hindu Kush mountains of the Kunar province. With him are the rest of SDVT-1^{[clarification needed]}, except Shane E. Patton, for whomDanny Dietz was substituted. Their mission, Operation Red Wings, was to observe a village and capture or kill a leading Talibanmember thought to be allied with Osama bin Laden.

One night in June 2005, while hiding out, the team encountered three shepherds, including a boy. The team debated killing the shepherds, but after a vote, team leader Michael Murphy decided to uphold the rules of engagement and let the shepherds go. About an hour later, the four SEALs were surrounded by more than a hundred Taliban warriors. The New York Times sums up the story:

Mr. Luttrell was the only one of four men on the mission to survive after a violent clash with dozens of Taliban fighters.

Eight members of the SEALs and eight Army special operations soldiers who came by helicopter to rescue the original four were shot down, and all aboard were killed.

Luttrell was then rescued by a group of Afghan Pashtun villagers who harbored him in their homes for several days, protecting him from the Taliban and ultimately helping him to safety."

—The New York Times, August 9, 2007^[2]

Hospitality as understood by the Pashtun culture is a central theme.

THE SAMURAI'S GARDEN BY GAIL TSUKIYAMA

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The Samurai's Garden

by Gail Tsukiyama

4.1 of 5 stars 4.10  ·   rating details  ·  12,399 ratings  ·  1,151 reviews

A 20-year-old Chinese painter named Stephen is sent to his family's summer home in a Japanese coastal village to recover from a bout with tuberculosis. Here he is cared for by Matsu, a reticent housekeeper and a master gardener. Over the course of a remarkable year, Stephen learns Matsu's secret and gains not only physical strength, but also profound spiritual insight. Matsu is a samurai of the soul, a man devoted to doing good and finding beauty in a cruel and arbitrary world, and Stephen is a noble student, learning to appreciate Matsu's generous and nurturing way of life and to love Matsu's soul-mate, gentle Sachi, a woman afflicted with leprosy.
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BREWSTER BY MARK SLOUKA

Winner of the American Library Association's Alex Award. It's 1968. The world is changing, and sixteen-year-old track star Jon Mosher is determined to change with it. Stuck in Brewster, he forms a friendship with rebellious Ray Cappicciano and headstrong Karen Dorsey, embarking on a race to redeem his past in this heart-wrenching story of love and friendship.

THE INVENTION OF WINGS BY SUE MONK KIDD

Hetty "Handful” Grimke, an urban slave in early nineteenth century Charleston, yearns for life beyond the suffocating walls that enclose her within the wealthy Grimke household. The Grimke’s daughter, Sarah, has known from an early age she is meant to do something large in the world, but she is hemmed in by the limits imposed on women.

Kidd’s sweeping novel is set in motion on Sarah’s eleventh birthday, when she is given ownership of ten year old Handful, who is to be her handmaid.We follow their remarkable journeys over the next thirty-five years, as both strive for a life of their own, dramatically shaping each other’s destinies and forming a complex relationship marked by guilt, defiance, estrangement and the uneasy ways of love.
As the stories build to a riveting climax, Handful will endure loss and sorrow, finding courage and a sense of self in the process. Sarah will experience crushed hopes, betrayal, unrequited love, and ostracism before leaving Charleston to find her place alongside her fearless younger sister, Angelina, as one of the early pioneers in the abolition and women’s rights movements.

Inspired by the historical figure of Sarah Grimke, Kidd goes beyond the record to flesh out the rich interior lives of all of her characters, both real and invented, including Handful’s cunning mother, Charlotte, who courts danger in her search for something better.

This exquisitely written novel is a triumph of storytelling that looks with unswerving eyes at a devastating wound in American history, through women whose struggles for liberation, empowerment, and expression will leave no reader unmoved.