Absolutely lovely, and for some reason more 'enjoyable' than other serious juveniles I've read. I think I liked it because Kati had a life beyond her mother's illness - she even laughed and made friends. ( )

Kati, a nine-year-old girl lives with her grandparents and dreams of her mother who left five years earlier. Finally, it's revealed that her mother has ALS and is close to death. The separation from her mother seems cruel, but it is obvious there's a lot of love in this family. They are reunited for Kati's mother's last days, a time where Kati learns a lot about her family. Before dying, Kati's mother tells her how she can contact her father who she has never met. The final chapters detail Kati's choice to seek out her father or not. This is a touching novel, written from a perspective that realistically portrays the way a child views the world and deals with difficult issues like death. ( )

It's probably not all that surprising that those oft-quoted lines from Wordsworth's My Lost Youth kept running through my mind as I read this slender children's novel from Thailand: "There are things of which I may not speak; / There are dreams that cannot die; / There are thoughts that make the strong heart weak, / And bring a pallor into the cheek, / And a mist before the eye." This is, after all, the story of a young girl, the eponymous Kati, who lives surrounded by unasked questions, unspoken realities, and a longing that is all the fiercer for its silence.

"Mother never promised to return." / "Kati waited every day for Mother." / "In the house there were no photos of Mother." / "No one ever spoke of Mother." So read the first four chapter sub-titles in this understated, quietly powerful story, subtitles which provide a textual guide to Kati's (initially) unvoiced but all-consuming concern: why had her mother left her with her grandparents, five years before, never to return? Why did no one in the house speak of her, of what she was doing, and where she had gone? Most of all, when would she be coming back...?

The answers to these questions, and the process whereby Kati comes to accept them, form the crux of this lovely story, which I found both poignant and peaceful. In a speech given by the author at the 2008 IBBY (International Board on Books for Young People) Congress, the book's explicitly Buddhist approach to grieving is mentioned, something that, given my lack of insight into the Buddhist worldview, I feel unequal to analyzing. That said, the story itself was beautifully written, and felt completely believable to me. Clearly Vejjajiva, herself afflicted with cerebral palsy, understands illness: the limitations it imposes, the choices it necessitates.

Those choices - specifically, the choices made by Kati's mother - have been hotly debated over in The International Children's Book Club to which I belong, where The Happiness of Kati is the January selection. But whatever one thinks of them, their effect is powerful, forcing the reader (if she is honest) to consider how she might handle such misfortune. Well worth reading, for young readers (and old) who have known a loved one who suffered from ALS (Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis), or any other debilitating disease; as well as for readers interested in Thailand, and Thai culture. ( )

http://shawjonathan.wordpress.com/2010/03/16/the-happiness-of-kati-2/

This book is a rarity: a children’s book written in Thai and translated into English.

At the start of the book Kati is nine years old and living with her grandparents. Her parents are noticeably absent, and the absence of her mother is particularly stark because each of the first several short chapter headings has a subheading that mentions her. The first chapter, for instance, is ‘Pan and Spatula’ with a subheading, ‘Mother never promised to return.’ The chapter has quite a lot to say about the pan and spatula Grandmother uses to cook rice, but is silent about Mother. Just as one is beginning to think Mother must be dead, it turns out that she is very ill, and there’s the possibility of visiting her. It’s a very effective device – and the complete silence about Kati’s father, which lasts quite a bit longer, gains power from it.

I don’t think it’s too spoilerish to say that Kati’s mother has motor neurone disease (or amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, as it’s called in this US translation), and that she dies. I won’t go further into spoiler territory, except to say that if this were an Australian or US book, there would very probably be a big emotional death scene towards the end of the book, but here the death happens so quietly that I wasn’t sure it had happened until a couple of paragraphs later, and it comes at about the two-thirds mark. This unexpected structure, as much as the unfamiliar food, plants and family relationships, made me aware I was engaging with a mind from a different culture. I enjoyed it and I’m glad it slipped through the net to reach English-speaking young people – though I notice that my copy was withdrawn from the Albany NY Public Library less than four years after publication without much wear and tear, suggesting that it didn’t reach very many of them. ( )

I would definitely recommend this book to YA's. I never realized how real YA books could be I think its great that their is literature like this out there for YA's and I would have liked reading these books when I was growing up if I would have been introduced to them. I love how the author explained Kati's situation and her mothers impossible situation and how Kati so lovingly excepted everything. The ending really surprised me and made me happy.