Under the Blood-Red Sun: Chapters 1–6

by Graham Salisbury
During World War II, a Japanese-American boy must rely on his baseball teammates when his father and grandfather are arrested.

Here are links to our lists for the novel: Chapters 1–6, Chapters 7–14, Chapters 15–22
25 words 140 learners

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Full list of words from this list:

words only definitions & notes
  1. hysterical
    marked by excessive or uncontrollable emotion
    Usually, my friend Billy Davis and I thought it was pretty funny when he did something strange like that—like wash a flag, or take a bath in the stream, or laugh hysterically at Laurel and Hardy movies.
  2. inflexible
    incapable of adapting or changing to meet circumstances
    The old way was fair and honorable, which was good. But it was so inflexible.
  3. corrugated
    shaped into alternating parallel grooves and ridges
    I loved its silver-painted corrugated iron roof, which slanted down into gutters that flowed into the round water tank in the back.
  4. racket
    a loud and disturbing noise
    He laughed at the racket the birds made inside.
  5. irrigation
    the act of supplying dry land with water by artificial means
    Just the muffled hiss of the small irrigation stream that ran between Billy’s house and mine.
  6. fanatic
    a person motivated by irrational enthusiasm
    The Kaka’ako Boys were a bunch of too-young-for-varsity baseball fanatics like us, stink-eyed mitt-punchers who were getting ready to play for the Mick Sluggers at McKinley.
  7. scuff
    walk without lifting the feet
    We scuffed into class and settled down in the back row, screeching our wooden desks on the floor as we fell into them.
  8. delinquent
    a young offender
    So...what about the rest of those juvenile delinquents you run around with?
  9. maneuver
    a military training exercise
    Army guys were all over the place. They had maneuvers all the time.
  10. convoy
    a procession of land vehicles traveling together
    You could see convoys of green trucks and jeeps raising dust on the red-dirt roads past the cane fields.
  11. esteem
    the condition of being honored
    He was short and had big muscles, and was held in high esteem by Rico, because he was the younger brother of Tina, who lived in Rico’s dreams as his future girlfriend.
  12. incense
    a substance that produces a fragrant odor when burned
    And he lights some incense for her when the sun rises and when it sets. Every day. See, her spirit gives him guidance, and protection.
  13. sickle
    an edge tool for cutting grass or crops
    And for home plate, we cut out a piece of plywood, then got a sickle to make the grass short between the mound and the plate.
  14. rickety
    inclined to shake as from weakness or defect
    The place was poor and pretty rickety.
  15. wary
    marked by keen caution and watchful prudence
    Billy stood, keeping his eyes on Grampa, still wary.
  16. tendon
    a band of tissue connecting a muscle to its bony attachment
    The tendons in his neck stood out like wires.
  17. idle
    run disconnected
    Sanji met us out on the road, his old fishy-smelling truck rattling as it idled, or tried to idle, anyway. He had to pump on the gas pedal every time it sounded like it was about to die.
  18. tiller
    lever used to turn the rudder on a boat
    Papa steered from a long-armed wooden tiller in the back.
  19. hull
    the frame or body of a ship
    And Sanji just kept on working under the hull.
  20. wake
    the wave that spreads behind a boat as it moves forward
    The boat rose and fell in the dark, smooth and easy, slicing the morning water. The engine chugged and vibrated in the floorboards and spat out smoky bubbles in the wake.
  21. bank
    tip laterally
    Another plane appeared from the left and banked in to join the first one.
  22. frenzy
    state of violent mental agitation
    A school of flying fish the size of three baseball fields skipped over the sea in a frenzy, trying to escape the birds above and the feeding aku below.
  23. gunwale
    a plank or ridge at the top of the side of a boat
    I finally got it to where it was just below the gunwale. Papa leaned over and wrapped the line around his bare hand.
  24. glower
    look angry or sullen as if to signal disapproval
    Billy glowered over at me.
  25. swell
    a rising and falling movement of the surface of the sea
    The sea was quiet and smooth, with only long, slow swells moving under the boat.
Created on Fri Nov 26 11:04:18 EST 2021 (updated Tue Dec 07 11:23:55 EST 2021)

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