More praise for Juliet Kono's Anshū
As promised, here is more advance praise for Juliet Kono's novel Anshū, which Bamboo Ridge Press will publish in September.
For more about Anshū, see "Anshū: powerful novel coming in September." I am moved by the strong personal impact of the book on these early readers.
Juliet S. Kono has crafted a remarkable novel, weaving together experiences of darkness and flames and turning it into a story of luminous strength and determination. Himiko is a very young child who is consumed with fire—burns them everywhere even at the risk of turning her own body into fuel for the flames. Pregnant in pre-World War II Hilo, Hawai‘i, she is sent to Japan where she encounters harsh treatment from relatives who have little to spare. Caught in Japan during WWII, she endures the firebombing of Tokyo, an event akin to the planned devastation of Dresden, Germany. Later, she becomes a victim of the Hiroshima atomic bomb. As a cruelly scarred hibakusha, she makes her way back to life as an American in Occupied Japan. But she works her way to relative freedom from worldly constraints. Woven through this world of fire, Kono intersperses the gentle offerings of Japanese Buddhism, not the meditative Zen of American celebrities but the counsel of centuries of experience passing through earthly existence, “this burning house.” This is a great story, lovingly written by someone whose skills were honed by years of dedication to poetry. Read this book.
—Franklin Odo, founding director of the Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Program
Simply put, Juliet Kono fleshes out the heroism that defines the miracle of survival during World War II Japan and after the dropping of the atomic bomb on Hiroshima. We follow Hi-chan (child of fire) from the Big Island of Hawai‘i when, because of her pregnancy, she must emigrate to Japan and live with impoverished relatives. Enduring hardships and loss—trials by fire—Hi-chan becomes a courageous, self-sacrificing Japanese woman, as admirable as her author. That is, ultimately, Kono, through graceful yet unstinting prose, gives us a memorable story of atonement and transcendence.
—Joe Tsujimoto, author of Morningside Heights: New York Stories
From Hilo to Hiroshima, Anshū traces the harrowing journey of its “fiery” young protagonist, Himiko Aoki, through the cataclysmic events of World War II and its aftermath in Japan. It is a courageous and necessary book, steeped in the wisdom of Buddhist cosmology, taking on the large issues of the human condition. Through its rich detailing of the “dark sorrow” of a single human journey, Himiko’s story illuminates the relation of each of us to the other, of the very small to the incomprehensible.
—Sylvia Watanabe, author of Talking to the Dead
Tags: Anshū, Bamboo Ridge, Hilo, Japan, Juliet Kono, World War II
