This lovingly illuminated double portrait asks us to think about what has changed and what has not, and at what cost.
A multigenerational family saga set in World War II Japan and contemporary rural Texas.
Churchill’s debut unfolds in parallel the stories of an immigrant Japanese woman and her American granddaughter. Mineko’s story begins in Kadoma, a district of Osaka, in the summer of 1936, when the little girl discovers a beautiful abandoned estate on a hill, its entrance presided over by a stone turtle, with a pond full of live turtles out back. Over the years, this becomes her special place, a refuge for the athletic, bright young woman who’s gotten none of the beauty her mother and sister share. When she meets an upper-class boy named Akio, it’s at this “turtle house” where she teaches him to swim, and where they fall in love, though his future holds an arranged marriage and, even more threatening, the wartime draft. In parallel chapters set in Curtain, Texas, in 1999, we see Mineko as “Grandminnie,” relating her stories into a tape recorder for her 25-year-old granddaughter, Lia, who’s back home after abruptly quitting her first job out of architecture school under mysterious circumstances. The two are sharing a bedroom at Lia’s parents’ house, since Grandminnie’s own home has burned to the ground, also under mysterious circumstances. Based on the life of the author’s grandmother, Mineko’s story illuminates an impressively wrought series of settings, from prewar provincial Japan, to wartime housing on a U.S. Army base, to small-town postwar America. Meanwhile, Lia’s story takes us to architecture school at the University of Texas at Austin. In each of these places, Churchill highlights the challenges faced by girls and women, from oppressive cultural norms to domestic violence and sexual harassment. She deftly manages a very large cast of characters and a complicated plot.
This lovingly illuminated double portrait asks us to think about what has changed and what has not, and at what cost.Pub Date: Feb. 20, 2024
ISBN: 9780063290518
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Dec. 6, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2024
A dramatic, vividly detailed reconstruction of a little-known aspect of the Vietnam War.
A young woman’s experience as a nurse in Vietnam casts a deep shadow over her life.
When we learn that the farewell party in the opening scene is for Frances “Frankie” McGrath’s older brother—“a golden boy, a wild child who could make the hardest heart soften”—who is leaving to serve in Vietnam in 1966, we feel pretty certain that poor Finley McGrath is marked for death. Still, it’s a surprise when the fateful doorbell rings less than 20 pages later. His death inspires his sister to enlist as an Army nurse, and this turn of events is just the beginning of a roller coaster of a plot that’s impressive and engrossing if at times a bit formulaic. Hannah renders the experiences of the young women who served in Vietnam in all-encompassing detail. The first half of the book, set in gore-drenched hospital wards, mildewed dorm rooms, and boozy officers’ clubs, is an exciting read, tracking the transformation of virginal, uptight Frankie into a crack surgical nurse and woman of the world. Her tensely platonic romance with a married surgeon ends when his broken, unbreathing body is airlifted out by helicopter; she throws her pent-up passion into a wild affair with a soldier who happens to be her dead brother’s best friend. In the second part of the book, after the war, Frankie seems to experience every possible bad break. A drawback of the story is that none of the secondary characters in her life are fully three-dimensional: Her dismissive, chauvinistic father and tight-lipped, pill-popping mother, her fellow nurses, and her various love interests are more plot devices than people. You’ll wish you could have gone to Vegas and placed a bet on the ending—while it’s against all the odds, you’ll see it coming from a mile away.
A dramatic, vividly detailed reconstruction of a little-known aspect of the Vietnam War.Pub Date: Feb. 6, 2024
ISBN: 9781250178633
Page Count: 480
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: Nov. 4, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2023
PERSPECTIVES
BOOK TO SCREEN
SEEN & HEARD
A sweet bedtime story.
A boy and his stuffed bear head into the woods.
Having captured readers’ attention with Born a Crime (2016), his bestselling memoir of growing up in South Africa, comedian and television host Noah has written a parable about decision-making. As he puts it in a brief prologue, “It’s about disagreements and difference—but it’s also about how we bridge those gaps and find what matters most, whether we’re parents or kids, neighbors, gnomes, or political adversaries. It’s a picture book, but it’s not a children’s book. Rather, it is a book for kids to share with parents and for parents to share with kids.” With plentiful illustrations by Hahn and in language aimed at young listeners, it tells the story of a small boy so impatient to start his Saturday adventures that he rebels against the rules of his household and heads out without brushing his teeth or making his bed, despite the reminders of his stuffed bear, Walter. “We can’t just run away,” protests the bear. “Your mother will miss you. And where will we sleep? And who will make us waffles?” “We’ll build our own house,” the boy responds. “And we’ll grow our own waffles!” From there, the pair go on their walkabout, encountering a garden gnome, a pair of snails, and a gang of animated coins who have lessons to offer about making choices. Though the author suggests in the introduction that adult readers might enjoy the book on their own, those looking for a follow-up to the memoir or a foray into adult fiction should be warned that this is not that book.
A sweet bedtime story.Pub Date: Oct. 8, 2024
ISBN: 9780593729960
Page Count: 128
Publisher: One World/Random House
Review Posted Online: July 4, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2024
BOOK REVIEW
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