Asian characters

Himawari House by Harmony Becker

| Tasha
Cover image for Himawari House.

Himawari House by Harmony Becker (9781250235565)

Nao grew up not fitting in in the United States, hoping to find a place that felt more like home in Japan. She had visited as a child, but now was going to be attending Japanese cram school. She moved into Himawari House, a house shared with several other students, all attending the school but at different levels. Nao discovers that fitting in isn’t as simple as a shared language, especially when she doesn’t speak it as well as she thought. Two of the girls who also live in the house have left their own countries to study in Japan. They all learn to find a way to connect with both Japanese culture and their own. Whether it is through shared food, watching shows together around a laptop, or reconnecting with family they left behind.

This graphic novel is wonderful. There is so much tangled in the stories of the three girls. Each of the teens is a unique person with specific experiences that led them to come to Japan, whether it was well-planned or almost a whim. They all face difficulties and handle them in their own ways, which tell the reader even more about who they are. Add in a touch of romance and their search for a place to belong becomes painfully personal and amazingly universal at the same time.

The art is phenomenal. From silly nods to manga style to serious moments that shine with a play of light and shadow to character studies that reveal so much in a single image of one of the characters, the illustrations run a full gamut of styles and tones. The language in the book is also fascinating, sharing the English mixed with other languages, changes in linguistic formats and the blank moments that happen when learning a language. It’s all so cleverly done.

A great graphic novel that explores finding a place in the world to belong. Appropriate for ages 13-18.

Reviewed from e-galley provided by First Second.

From the Tops of the Trees by Kao Kalia Yang

| Tasha
Cover image for From the Tops of the Trees.

From the Tops of the Trees by Kao Kalia Yang, illustrated by Rachel Wada (9781541581302)

A true story from the Hmong author’s childhood, this picture book brings readers to the Ban Vinai Refugee Camp in Thailand in 1985. Their days are filled with hunger and finding fruit that they can pretend are candy. The aunties in the camp talk about the war and their fears of returning to the old country or heading to a new country. Every week the families in the camp are given enough food for three days. It’s a practice meant to deter other Hmong refugees from entering the country. After Kao asks about the world beyond the camp, her father takes her to the tallest tree in camp, climbs with her to the highest branches, and gives her a view of the world beyond the camp.

Yang shows the view of the refugee camp from that of a small child living there. The day is filled with happy moments like riding one of the dogs and racing the chickens for rice balls. Yet there is no escaping that they are in a refugee camp. Yang shares this by having the adults talk about the war, showing the food disbursement, and having Kao explain that they can’t leave but others can enter. The climb into the branches is dramatic and inspiring, a look a freedom that could not be more moving and tangible.

Wada uses a mix of traditional media like graphite and watercolor with digital tools. She shows Yang’s small family, using more saturated colors to pull them out of the crowds and to keep the focus on the young Kao in the camps. The colors are sandy and subtle, becoming deeper as they reach the treetop to see the world around them.

Another gorgeous and skilled picture book from Yang that captures the experience of the Hmong refugee camps and Hmong Americans. Appropriate for ages 5-8.

Reviewed from e-galley provided by Carolrhoda Books.

These Violent Delights by Chloe Gong

| Tasha
Cover image for These Violent Delights

These Violent Delights by Chloe Gong (9781534457690)

This whirlwind of a novel is a grand retelling of Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet. Juliette Cai is in line to inherit the Scarlet Gang, one of the two gangs who rule 1920’s Shanghai. Juliette has spent the last few years in New York City, making her both a native of Shanghai but also partly an outsider. Upon her return to Shanghai, strange things start happening. A contagion is sweeping the city, causing those who catch it to tear out their own throats. Juliette is determined to figure out what is actually happening, a desire that causes her to have to work with her former lover, Roma, who is the heir to the White Flowers, the rival gang. After being brutally dumped by him, Juliette is wary of whether Roma is telling the truth. But when his own sister succumbs to the contagion, the two begin working together in earnest, encountering murder, death, monsters and much more.

This book is full of so much depth and such brilliant world building that it is nearly impossible to believe it’s a debut novel. Gong writes with real skill here, managing the pacing of the book beautifully, slowing it at appropriate times and allowing it to dash madly at others. The result is a book that sweeps up readers, offering them a glimpse of a fictional Shanghai that dazzles. Gong also riffs on the original very cleverly, not tying herself too tightly to Shakespeare but close enough that there are glimpses of that tale throughout the book.

The two main characters are marvelously driven and willing to kill people along the way. Gong does not soften the ongoing blood feud or what it has cost both Juliette and Roma. She also makes Juliette the one more likely to resort to direct violence, which is dynamite. The puzzle at the heart of the book is complicated and strange, leading directly to the next book in the series.

A dynamite first book in a dazzling fantasy series. Appropriate for ages 14-18.

Reviewed from copy provided by Margaret K. McElderry Books.