Naomi Hirahara

A young married woman and her parents return to Los Angeles with her new husband. It's been years since they were sent to the Manzanar internment camp and they hope to rebuild the lives they enjoyed before the Second World War. But before the war, Japanese Americans were not allowed to own property and their homes and businesses are now occupied by others. Aki is a nursing assistant at the Japanese hospital where she is shocked to discover that the elderly man admitted to the hospital with show more serious wounds is the father of her husband's good friend. She never liked Babe, but could he really have battered his own father? As she looks for answers, she stumbles into a larger series of crimes, while also learning about the conditions of many of the returning Japanese-Americans are living in.

This is a mystery novel where the mystery is far less important than the time and place. Hirahara is great at explaining the history of how Japanese-Americans have been treated before, during and after WWII. I knew some of the basics, but Hirahara brings out so many small details of what life was like on a daily basis. The mystery was overly complicated and didn't hold up, but the reason to read this novel is for the way it brings a little-known piece of American history to life. show less

Aki Ito’s life changed with the bombing of Pearl Harbor and the onset of World War II. Aki, her parents, and her older sister, Rose, were forced to leave their home in Los Angeles and they were detained in Manzanar. Eventually, Rose was sent to Chicago, where the rest of the family was to join her in the Japanese American community near Clark and Division. Shortly before the family arrived, Rose was killed by a subway train. The official ruling is suicide, but Aki is convinced that Rose show more wouldn’t have killed herself. There must be more to Rose’s death, and Aki is determined to find the truth.

This mystery is more character driven than plot driven. Its strong sense of place and time will appeal to many historical fiction fans. Readers discover World War II era Chicago along with Aki as she explores Clark and Division and beyond. show less

It seems that 12-year-old Angela Kato is being shipped down to Los Angeles for the summer to live with her grandparents, Grandma Michi and Gramps. She suspects her being sent away has something to do with an estrangement she senses between her parents. She's very worried they're in the process of splitting up. But, of course, no one will say anything.

Angela is third generation Japanese, which basically means pretty much fully American with little understanding of her Japanese heritage other show more than a few words or phrases. Her grandparents, of course, are still well steeped in their Japanese culture, and Angela has to figure things out for herself, because it's not part of the culture to provide clear lessons. Just not done.

Angela's grandparents have a wedding business. Gramps does floral arrangements, and Grandma Michi and her daughter, Aunt Janet, make arrangements of origami cranes. There must be exactly 1001 cranes in the arrangement for each wedding. Naturally, once Angela arrives, she is set to folding paper cranes.

The problem with folding origami cranes is that it takes quite a lot of time (but a super good meditative activity). Also, Grandma Michi grades the cranes: 'A', 'B', 'C', 'D'. She goes through Angela's work at the end of each day and places the cranes into appropriate piles. This is very discouraging at first, but eventually Angela becomes pretty competent and has fewer and fewer of her cranes delegated to the 'C' and 'D' piles.

Well, lots of other things go on. Angela meets up with some local teenagers and a sick neighbor. She gets slightly more insight into the ways of her parents and grandparents. And all the crane folding turns out to be therapeutic. It's a bit of a coming of age experience for her.

But, of course, for me, it's all about the cranes. After a visit to Hiroshima some 15 years ago, I took up folding origami cranes. I've folded thousands of the damn things. My son and daughter-in-law, who met in Japan while they were over there in the JET program, wanted cranes for their wedding. Naturally, I was delegated to doing much of the folding. We had showers of white cranes along the aisles. We had little colored cranes nesting in the table centerpieces. We had mid-sized cranes holding the place cards indicating people's seating. Cranes galore. I'm grateful that my daughter-in-law didn't go through my cranes and delegate them into piles, 'A', 'B', 'C', and 'D'. Nope, bless her heart, she was just grateful for the oodles of cranes—yes, some a bit disfigured—that helped make her wedding one of the most special events ever.

Anyway, this is a great book. Probably worth 4 *s at a minimum. Y'all should definitely read it. show less

Naomi Hirahara's Evergreen is billed as mystery (and yes, there's a mystery at its heart), but in reality it's a complex and beautiful exploration of life within a vilified minority community and the struggle to be perceived as "ordinary" and to be granted the rights of full citizenship.

The central character, Aki, and her family were held in the Manzanar internment center for Japanese Americans/enemy aliens during World War II. The internment ended two years ago. The family subsequently show more lived in Chicago (where Aki's older sister died) and has now returned to Los Angeles where they lived before the war.

Not exactly where they lived before—their former home is now occupied by others, but they have found a place for themselves in a different neighborhood. Thousands of Japanese Americans who haven't found housing are living in resettlement centers while trying to rebuild their prewar lives. Some of these resettlement centers offer safety and a relatively comfortable existence. Others are far worse than the internment camps were, with inadequate housing and a lack of basic necessities like running water and proper bathrooms. In addition, the end to the war has not brought an end to the popular view of Japanese Americans as the enemy

Aki now works as a nurse's aid in a Boyle Heights hospital that primarily serves Japanese Americans. Almost everyone around her—doctors, nurses, and patients alike—is recovering from the internment. Aki married in Chicago before she, her husband, and her parents made the move west. Being a newlywed in a home shared with parents is awkward, but also a relative privilege. Aki's husband has begun working as a reporter for a community newspaper. His coworkers are polished journalists with well-informed, complex views on current politics, both local and national, which Aki finds intimidating.

When Aki helps care for a patient who clearly has suffered repeated beatings, but who minimizes his injuries, she begins to worry about his safety. It turns out that this patient is the father of Babe, her husband's best friend from the army. Babe is the one who dropped the camera, leaving Aki and her husband with no wedding pictures. He's a small-time gangster and womanizer. In other words, Babe is not someone upon whom Aki is likely to look kindly. Worrying that Babe may be responsible for her patient's injuries, Aki begins investigating. Then, she learns that Babe is wanted by the police.

The narrative built around the question of Babe's probable responsibility for his father's injuries provides the main impetus for the plot's action, but more than the specifics of that case, what makes this novel resonant and powerful are the many portraits of individuals in this rebuilding community. There's a doctor who has put off retirement to continue providing care for his community; an orphaned friend from Manzanar who is considering a religious career; the younger brother this friend is raising and hoping to gain custody of; friends from Chicago who are becoming wealthy leaders in Los Angeles while drifting apart; a lawyer trying to help Japanese American business people regain ownership of businesses that they lost during the internment period; the African Americans who worked in the defense industry and moved into what was once a Japanese American neighborhood.

Hirahara provides readers with a rich mix of perspectives, so that readers understand not just Aki's journey, but the journeys of those around her as well. The novel is remarkably gentle given the material it covers, gentle in that it focuses on day-to-day life, where *being* is the focus as much as is *doing.* Aki comes to see her own world more complexly, gradually becoming politically active and beginning to question her assumptions about others.

Hirahara offers character-driven writing that's panoramic in scope and built around a mystery that becomes a quest for justice. Whether you're looking for a mystery set in an interesting context or a fictional exploration of internment and its cultural and financial impacts, you'll be delighted with Evergreen. I hope I'll be able to spend a great deal more time with Hirahara's Aki in the future.

I received a free electronic review copy of this title from the publisher via Edelweiss; the opinions are my own. show less