Name Me Nobody-- Lois-Ann Yamanaka

Friend P suggested I read something by Lois-Ann Yamanaka. Thank for leading me to this great book!

I immediately love Emi-Lou. Outcast, overweight, and abandoned by her mother, she has three bright spots in her life, her grandmother and her best friend Yvonne being the two obvious ones. But Emi-Lou is also her own bright spot; over the course of the book, we see her become more compassionate, a better friend, and able to stand up for herself and others.

Emi-Lou and Yvonne are soul sisters-- "wherever Yvonne go, Emi-Lou go too." Together, they join the local softball team; Emi-Lou pushes Yvonne to be the best player she can, and Yvonne pushes Emi-Lou to lose weight. But when Yvonne gets romantically involved with her teammate Babes, Emi-Lou feels her world falling apart-- she wants her best friend to be "normal."

Watching this all play out is so painful. Emi-Lou just doesn't know how to handle Yvonne's relationship with Babes. She gets crap from her aunt Vicky and her classmates about being Yvonne's spurned "femme," accused of being jealous. Meanwhile, Emi-Lou isn't used to her newly-thin body and how people treat her; she continues to "feel fat" and struggle with emotional eating. She has an on-and-off relationship with a guy who cares more about his image than about her, and crushes on a popular jock who tries to use her in every way. It's like a high school horror show. I wanted to scream watching all these bad things happen, the very worst of which is seeing Emi-Lou drive a wedge into her relationship with her best friend.

In the end, the best part for me was the story's three heroines-- tough and forgiving Yvonne, solid-loving Grandma, and an Emi-Lou who emerges from codependency and inadequacy and self-doubt. It's worth all the hurt.

(And, seriously, I cannot overstate the awesomeness of Grandma.)

When the Emperor Was Divine-- Julie Otsuka

As I read this, a thought occurred to me: why didn't we read a single book about Japanese internment when I was in school? Up until high school, history classes alternated between state history and U.S. history; internment could have been taught in either context, but it wasn't. I mentioned in a previous review that I had two Holocaust literature units in high school, but nowhere did we discuss the atrocities that transpired only miles from our own homes.

The brief and poetic When the Emperor Was Divine would have been the perfect book for my middle school or freshman year classes. The first page, in and of itself, is exquisite. I got a chill envisioning this nameless woman walking down University Avenue, seeing an evacuation notice in the window, and going home to pack her things without knowing where exactly she was going.

The story follows the unnamed characters many places-- to the backyard of their Berkeley bungalow, a train headed east, an internment camp in the Utah desert, and memories of the past-- but only with occasional glimpses into their innermost feelings. Most of what we know of the characters is divined from their actions: the practical mother does her best to keep her conduct from betraying emotion, the young boy's thought processes are full of unspoken fear, and the girl simply runs away from the reader. We observe the most intimate, telling things about these characters, but they don't even have names. In some ways, we don't know them at all.

I did not expect the book to follow the family back home. For all I knew about internment, I had never imagined what that return must have felt like. The violated house and the coldness of the neighborhood are one thing, but the family that returns to the house is also very different from the one that left.

Kira-Kira-- Cynthia Kadohata

"She was going to be the best in the world and live at the top of everything, and she was going to bring her family with her. This is one of the themes of my sister's life."

Lynn, through the eyes of her younger sister Katie, is perfect. Lynn teaches Katie that life is beautiful ("kira-kira" means "glittering"-- it's Katie's first word, which Lynn taught her after many nights of looking up at the stars). Their parents also leave it to Lynn to break difficult news to Katie (and before her first day of school, Lynn tells Katie that she may be called names and treated as different). Katie doesn't want to do anything without Lynn, but when her sister is struck with mysterious illness, Katie has no choice.

The focus of Kira-Kira is the bittersweet sibling relationship, but the book is extraordinary in its exploration of growing up nikkei in the Jim Crow south. In a world divided along the lines of black and white, Katie doesn't know how she fits in. Katie's parents, like the other members of the small Japanese community, work in the chicken hatcheries in town. The hours are long and hard, without even breaks to use the bathroom, and the wealthy owner of the enterprise tries to crush the workers’ attempts to unionize.

I wish these compelling features of the book had more been the focus, but the family issues make this an accessible read.

1001 Cranes-- Naomi Hirahara

Over the course of this year, I hope to come to peace with the so-called “middle reader” novel. These books are rather awkward things, much like the age group for which they are written—mature readers as young as 10, up to 14 years. The language of these novels must be relatively simple, but the story itself must speak to the vastly different experiences within this age group. Four years is an eternity when you consider how much your world can change between sixth grade and your freshman year of high school.

I remember thinking that the protagonists of these books were ridiculous, because as ridiculous as the actions of 12 and 13 year-olds may seem to an adult, they were beyond what I as a 10 year old could relate to. I also found them annoyingly predictable. Yet, as an adult, I have a theoretical respect for what middle reader books attempt to do—that is, to sustain an interest in reading and guide young people from picture books to young adult novels. I think of middle readers novels as a long, rickety bridge between Chris Van Allsburg and J.D. Salinger (although there is also the route taken by the precocious M, who headed straight for Stephen King). I have respect for authors that embrace the challenge and write stories that speak to the difficult realities and inner turmoil of their young readers.

Naomi Hirahara’s 1001 Cranes, had me thanking my lucky stars that I was no longer 12 years old, but it’s one of the better middle reader novels.

Angie Kato arrives in the L.A. suburb of Gardena to spend the summer with her mother’s parents and sister. In the beginning, she longs for the familiar world of her northern California home—her friends, the leisurely afternoons, and her parents. Instead, Angie’s world is full of unfamiliar people, days in the family shop folding paper cranes, and occasional phone calls from her mom and dad as they prepare for a divorce.

In the typical narrative arc of these “formative summer” books, a crush plays itself out towards heartbreak, the protagonist learns that she is more like her mother and grandmother than she originally thought, and her relationships with others become more responsible and emotionally engaged.

The book involves some interesting identity issues. Angie has difficulty identifying with Japanese-Americans; she describes her trips into San Francisco’s Japanese community as part of her “weekend life” as opposed to her “real life.” Observations such as these might be close to home for some readers, insulting to others. Angie has uneasy relationships with other people in general, and she finds the Japanese church-going neighbors, youth group kids, and her culturally knowledgeable grandmother particularly intimidating.

Angie’s family histories are a major highlight of the story: her parents participated in sit-ins in their undergraduate days at Stanford (Angie is named after Angela Davis), her grandmother Michi grew up in an orphanage for Japanese-American kids, and her grandfather was interned in Arkansas during WWII. The Inui family’s experiences allude to the diversity of experience in the Japanese-American community, which may be an interesting introduction to young readers.