Fear

One theme that she uses in the book as kind of a underlying idea is how much the fear was two sided especially in the beginning.. I was so struck when she talked about her brother’s relief of them being moved to camps. The fear they had of being persecuted and attacked on the outside.
Of course that being said you have to wonder if he would have been so eager if he had known the conditions he would be thrown into but all the same maybe he would. People in general will on a whole in my opinion put up with a lot for protection. However at the same time they had to in some ways be just as fearful if not more so of the people they were putting their trust in.
Another time this comes to the forefront is in chapter ten in her shot aside about the reservoir shack. Her brother-in-law and his fellow workers when staring to the faces of the soldiers saw fear similar to what was in their own eyes. It really shows how the whole internment situation had more to do with fear and lack of understanding rather than any real danger.