TWO JAPANESE INTERNMENT GRAPHIC NOVEL REVIEWS

 In my search for graphic novels to help me understand the genre, I came across these two books in my local library. Although totally different from each other, they both share the common element of Japanese internment camps during WWII.

DISPLACEMENT by kiku hughes

The first page of this YA time travel novel provides a backstory to equip the reader for the coming story. Written in first person, the character Kiku, explains that it is 2016 and she's been trapped in the past for over a year.

She's in San Francisco with her mother who is searching for the house where her mother grew up in. They didn't find the house.

Instead, Kiku found displacement.

She is taken back to the 1940s to the Japanese internment camp to which her grandmother, Earnestina and her parents, were taken. The story interweaves Earnestina's story with fictional elements of Kiku's time travel.

Through expressive images and dialogue, the author shows Kiku's loneliness, confusion, helplessness, and gratitude when she makes a few friends. She overhears Earnestina speaking Japanese in the rooms next to hers, but can't understand the language. Her roommate, Aiko, doesn't encourage her to learn Japanese. Kiku thinks,

But seeing how she and other Nisei (second generation) shied away from the Issei's (first generation) outdated traditions made me understand a little more just why there was almost no connection to Japan left by the time I was born. (p. 96)

Life is physically and emotionally difficult in the camp and Kiku vacillates between waiting to return home and making the best of the situation. When a neighbor gives her a small carving with her name on it, she recognizes a similar item that her mother had that belonged to Earnestina. I felt an intense connection to my grandmother in that moment. We were linked through this community, and I held the proof in my hand." (p. 128)

She moves to the Topaz relocation center in Utah and hears that a friend's father was taken to an army camp. They fear that they might not hear from him because they took his books and maps which made the government suspicious. Being from the future meant very little when my education on the past was so limited. (p. 154)

The illustrations are drawn with clean lines and the character's emotions are clearly portrayed. A palette of aqua and brown provide a calming effect for the turbulent story that unfolds.

I thought that the author depicted the conflicts of this time and place extremely well. Although the time travel aspects and resolution to the story were also well constructed,  I didn't like that the protagonist fell in love with another girl. As a conservative Christian, that aspect of the book detracted from the book's overall appeal. After googling kiku hughes, I realized that the protagonist reflects the author's orientation. 

TAKE WHAT YOU CAN CARRY  by Kevin C. Pyle

Although this is also a graphic novel about the Japanese internment camps (with a surprisingly similar palette to Displacement), it is handled in a totally different manner. As you might assume from the cover, this is two stories in one book. The brown illustrations show the life of Mr. Himitsu as a young man in the Tanforan Assembly Center and then later in the internment camp in Manzanar, California in 1942. The blue illustrations depict six months in the life of Kyle, a young teen who recently moved into a Chicago suburb in 1978. Both stories progress through the book. Sometimes several pages are given to the Japanese internment camp, and sometimes several pages show Kyle choosing to go deeper and deeper into vandalism and shoplifting. 

At first, I didn't like that there was no dialogue in Mr. Himitsu's story, only illustrations. But the second time through I was able to "read" the illustrations better and saw how Kevin Pyle showed parallels between the two stories--thirty-five years apart. 

• Each boy was in his own type of prison. 
• Each boy faced teasing and ridicule.
• Each boy faced unwelcome relocation.
• Each boy experienced trauma that left them feeling powerless.

But, there are a lot of differences too.

In Mr. Himitsu's story, a mentor provides an opportunity for him to vent his anger--on a piece of wood. He carves and carves and by the time he leaves the camp, his suitcase is full of wooden birds. 

In Kyle's story, he has moved into a brand new neighborhood. He starts hanging out with some other boys they are a negative influence on each other. Kyle ends up destroying property and shoplifting--just for the thrill it gives him. The ending perfectly brings the two stories together.

Here are some pages that show you how the author juxtaposed the two stories.

I asked Kevin what his connection was to this story. Here is his answer:

"The most obvious is that I was caught for shoplifting when I was 11 or 12 and I worked for the storeowner as restitution. It really made me see the consequences of my actions. As an adult I did illustrations for the national law journal and once did one on alternatives to sentencing for youth and it made me think back on the experience. I realized I never knew if it was my father’s idea or the storeowner’s that I work off my debt and that sent my imagination rolling.

My other connection is that I had a painting teacher in college who was interned as a child. I wrote him while I was working on the book and he gave some good leads on research. He also read it before it was published and his comments were very inspiring and reassuring as to the accuracy. While the book was not intended as a straight history, I of course wanted to make sure it rang true."

Both authors drew from personal life events when writing and illustrating their graphic novels. As I plot Nightmare in Nuremberg, I'm aware that I'm doing the very same thing.

If you are interested, here is my review of Gaijin, another graphic novel about the Japanese internment camps. And my review of Red Berries, White Clouds, and Blue Sky. 

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Congratulations to Sarah Johnson who won Southpaw Sully from last week's blog.

Don't forget to check out Greg Pattridge's MMGM blog with lots of other middle-grade book reviews!