{"id":5129,"date":"2023-07-25T06:48:29","date_gmt":"2023-07-25T13:48:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/?p=5129"},"modified":"2023-07-25T06:48:29","modified_gmt":"2023-07-25T13:48:29","slug":"naomi-hirahara-evergreen","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/naomi-hirahara-evergreen\/","title":{"rendered":"Naomi Hirahara: Evergreen"},"content":{"rendered":"

Japantown #2<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>The follow up to Hirahara\u2019s spectacular Clark and Division<\/em> finds the Ito family, released from detention camp and the follow up resettlement in Chicago, back in 1946 Los Angeles.\u00a0 After the Japanese were sent to camps, their homes and businesses were taken over, and they\u2019ve returned to try and build up their lives again.\u00a0 Our heroine, Aki, works as a nurse\u2019s aide and is waiting for her husband Art to return from the war.\u00a0 She and her parents have found a small home to rent which the two couples will share.<\/p>\n

If the first novel was about Aki\u2019s discovery of herself and her own personal strength after the death of her beloved sister, Rose, the second novel is about how she and Art, as newlyweds, are learning to live together and adjust to their new reality.\u00a0 Art has left home and family back in Chicago where he and Aki met, and the Itos are adjusting to post war, post camp life, with all that entails.\u00a0 Someone else lives in their former home.\u00a0 Mr. Ito\u2019s business is gone and he wants to reclaim it.\u00a0 Meanwhile, Art is recovering from the trauma of war.\u00a0 He and Aki aren\u2019t communicating too well, and it\u2019s causing problems.<\/p>\n

One of the flash points in their relationship is Art\u2019s war buddy, Babe, who earned Aki\u2019s eternal distrust by dropping the camera full of their only wedding photos.\u00a0 He\u2019s in Los Angeles, and Aki encounters him in the hospital, where his elderly father has been brought in, covered with bruises.\u00a0 Aki suspects Babe.\u00a0 When the father later turns up dead and Babe disappears, Aki decides to pursue it on her own, without telling Art.\u00a0 Art is busy with a job at the Japanese newspaper, the Rafu Shimpo<\/a>, <\/em>based in LA (the paper is still in publication today).<\/p>\n

Aki feels uncomfortable and uneducated around Art\u2019s friends, who are a mix of liberal journalist types, and she\u2019s determined to solve this puzzle.\u00a0 The lack of communication between the newlyweds has its consequences, however, making the scenes between the couple some of the most painful of the novel.<\/p>\n

Also painful, however, are the many stories of the hard working Japanese men and women who live is horrible circumstances as they try and find a footing after the war.\u00a0 The descriptions of some of the hastily created trailer camps where Japanese were forced to live is truly horrifying, and it turns out that Aki, during her investigations, is able to step up as a nurse and help out a few of the folks she encounters.<\/p>\n

The portrait of the racism and discrimination endured by the Japanese (who are sharing their former areas of town with African Americans who have relocated to LA), made me think after I closed the book that racism is the essential crime and tragedy of our country.\u00a0 It\u2019s tentacles are everywhere.\u00a0 While Hirahara has not written a polemic, she has<\/em> written a social justice novel, illuminating a part of our history that\u2019s difficult to read about, but essential to our knowledge of our country.\u00a0 What makes it a novel are the characters \u2013 Aki, Art and Babe are all finely drawn and unforgettable.\u00a0 The moral ambiguity faced by her characters makes them human, and to me, more believable.\u00a0 Hirahara is a wonderful writer. —\u00a0Robin Agnew<\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Japantown #2 The follow up to Hirahara\u2019s spectacular Clark and Division finds the Ito family, released from detention camp and the follow up resettlement in Chicago, back in 1946 Los Angeles.\u00a0 After the Japanese were sent to camps, their homes and businesses were taken over, and they\u2019ve returned to try and build up their lives … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[1291,1290,1289,10,1288,637,664],"class_list":["post-5129","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-reviews","tag-1946-los-angeles","tag-aki-nakasone","tag-evergreen","tag-historical","tag-japantown","tag-naomi-hirahara","tag-soho-crime"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5129","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5129"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5129\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5133,"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5129\/revisions\/5133"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5129"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5129"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5129"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}