Barbed Wire Between Us
By Mia Wenjen & Violeta Encarnación
$19.99
48 pages • Jacketed Hardcover • Ages 7-10 • ISBN: 978-1-63655-193-7 • Available March 31, 2026
Barbed Wire Between Us is a powerful reverso poem that tells two deeply resonant stories across time. It begins with a Japanese American girl sent to an internment camp in Oklahoma during World War II. Read in reverse, it reveals the journey of a Latina girl detained in the very same camp decades later, during the U.S. policy of migrant family separation. Harrowing and emotionally charged, this poetic narrative compels us to confront a haunting question: What have we truly learned in the past 80 years about how we treat the most vulnerable among us? With haunting symmetry and striking parallels, Barbed Wire Between Us is a moving meditation on justice, memory, and the echoes of history that still shape our present.
Click to enlarge
Mia Wenjen
Mia blogs about parenting, children’s books, and education at pragmaticmom.com. She is the co-creator of Multicultural Children’s Book Day/Read Your World. She is the author of several illustrated children’s books and lives in Boston with her husband and three kids. Follow her at PragmaticMom and on X, Instagram, Pinterest, and Facebook.
Violeta Encarnación
Violeta is an award-winning Cuban illustrator based in Brooklyn. She is a graduate of the School of Visual Arts in New York City and enjoys telling stories through her work and creating art with traditional materials, digital media, and animation. Barbed Wire Between Us is her second picture book project. Visit her online at violetaencarnacion.com.