Dear America: Where Have All the Flowers Gone?

10Feb10

Title: Dear America: Where Have All the Flowers Gone? The Diary of Molly MacKenzie Flaherty

Author: Ellen White

Year: 2002

Genre: Young Adult, History, Diary

Pages: 187

Series: Dear America

Where Have All the Flowers Gone? is the diary of Molly Flaherty, a 15-year old living in Boston during the Vietnam War. Molly tries to deal with her brother, Patrick, being a Marine (quick note: his story is in the My Name is America series, entitled: The Journal of Patrick Seamus Flaherty). Molly soon volunteers at a VA hospital all the while trying to figure out why the hell the US is invloved in Vietnam. She brings up many good questions such as asking why Communism is so bad. She goes on to reason, “Then I made things worse  by asking if we were over fighting Communism because we honestly think it’s a bad thing — or because the United States  just wants everyone to be exactly  like us, because  we think  we know best.” She then says that if the Vietnamese want to be Communism, then let them. She’s told later that while Communism may look good on paper (which it really does) it doesn’t exactly work in real life.

While World War II is my favorite, the Vietnam War era is my second favorite. There’s just something about protesting war and the hippies that make it all so interesting. I just wished that it went farther into the resistance movement of the war and the hippies (unless of course there is another Dear America book that deals with that, but I doubt it) I really liked this book and suggest it to anyone who enjoys this era as well.

Rating: 4/5

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Tags: 1968, Boston, Communism, Dear America, JUV FIC, Vietnam War