Project Mulberry by Linda Sue Park

Julia Song is a Korean-American middle schooler who lives in a Midwestern American town. With her friend Patrick she is trying to come up with a farm project for a club she belongs to. When her mother suggests raising silkworms, she is unenthusiastic as it is too "Korean" and she longs to be an all-American girl. But Patrick is enthusiastic and she can't come up with any other ideas, so after a solving a couple of problems they begin to raise their worms. The book is interspersed with conversations between Julia and the author, Linda Sue Park, discussing the writing process. In the audiobook, it worked quite well as the narrator and Linda Sue Park herself traded comments. The book has several subplots including Patrick and Julia learning about sustainable farming and making friends with an older African-American man who has the mulberry tree they need to feed the silkworm caterpillers. In the end Julia has to make a difficult choice when she learns how the silk is harvested. Overall it was an enjoyable, interesting story. Project Mulberry by Linda Sue Park. Random House Listening Library, 2005.