10 June 2025 AT LAST SHE STOOD: HOW JOEY GUERRERO SPIED, SURVIVED, AND FOUGHT FOR FREEDOM by Erin Entrada Kelly, HarperCollins/Greenwillow, May 2025, 208p., ISBN: 978-0-06-321890-1

“Now the flames they followed Joan of Arc

As she came riding through the dark

No moon to keep her armor bright

No man to get her through this very smoky night”

– Leonard Cohen (1971)

“In 1939, Joey develops a fever.

There is never a good time to get sick, but this is a particularly bad time. Joey’s little daughter, Cynthia, is only a toddler. It’s difficult to care for someone else when you don’t feel well, and Joey’s fever is relentless. No matter what she does, it won’t go away. And it’s not just the fever. Joey’s skin is flushed. There are red welts on her left arm and elbow. Trickles of blood dribble from her nose for no apparent reason. As soon as she thinks the nosebleeds are under control, another one is just around the corner.”

Joey Guerrero, whose childhood heroine was Joan of Arc, was 22 when these symptoms of Hansen’s disease (leprosy) upended her life. As former journalist-turned-Newbery Medalist Erin Entrada Kelly chronicles here, the medical regime of those less-enlightened days led to Joey’s forced separation from her husband and baby daughter. She would never again live a normal family life.

Two years later, as World War II descended upon the Philippines, Joey was in Manila secretly receiving medical care. Employing an umbrella to literally beat off unwanted attention from occupying Japanese soldiers barracked nearby, she was taken under wing by a couple involved with the Philippine guerilla movement, who were trying to help the Allies defeat Japan. She became a spy, sometimes hid messages in her braids, and characterized herself as “a little errand boy.”

But a bigger challenge awaited her. There were credible rumors that the Japanese intended to slaughter the prisoners in an internment camp before leaving town. 

“American troops want to storm the camp and rescue the prisoners, but the area is littered with land mines. Land mines are weapons that are concealed underground and explode under pressure, usually when they’re stepped on or driven over. If the Americans launch an attack without knowing where the land mines are, the results will be disastrous.”

Fortunately, the guerillas had a rough map of the minefield. Unfortunately, the map needed to be delivered to the U.S. military. They were then 40 miles away, through a maze of swampland and Japanese military checkpoints. 

Joey Guerrero had the guerillas tape the map to her back–her best shot at keeping it from being discovered (and staying alive). Then she walked a total of 60 life-threatening-every-moment miles, while suffering the agonies of Hansen’s disease, in order to successfully deliver the map and save a lot of lives. She would be presented a Medal of Freedom and would end up in America, spending nine years in a specialized Hansen’s disease care facility until she was officially “cured.” 

But her struggles did not end there. At one point, her U.S. visa expired and she had to fight to keep from being deported.. Fortunately, there were some who knew what she did for the Allies in the War and she eventually was granted American citizenship. Nevertheless, the superstition surrounding leprosy back in those days prevented her from keeping a steady job. Things got so bad that, at one point, she had to pawn her Medal of Freedom.

AT LAST SHE STOOD is a powerful tale about this heroic woman. But that’s just the beginning. This book is so much more. Readers learn about the history and geography of the Philippines. We get a solid overview of fascism and World War II. And we learn how, in my lifetime, the superstitions and forced isolations relating to leprosy for thousands of years have been blown apart by modern scientific breakthroughs.

This is an awesome and engaging piece of nonfiction for elementary and middle school readers.

Richie Partington, MLIS

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