Picked up a copy of this nonfiction book somewhere; its name was familiar because last year Oregon choose it as a 'read together' project for its 150th birthday.
I knew it was about Japanese immigrants settling in Oregon so I thought it would be an inspiring story of the melting pot, success of a New American.
Not so much.
With its unflinching look at how absolutely horrible Oregon treating the Japanese over the decades, we come out looking pretty awful. And that's probably the way it should be. Oregon seems to have topped the country in xenophobia.
Ms. Kessler's writing reads like journalism; her narrative is simple and clear and uncluttered by flowery description. Since the story follows the first immigrant of particular family and continues profiling it 100 years, it is good that her writing is so simple.
It was not impersonal however. I came to have affection for and understand many of the characters and developed empathy for the horrific things that happened to them.
It was definitely an important book to have been written, informing people about the strong history of racism against the Japanese using a single family as an example was a wise choice. It personalizes the whole debacle and makes it human-sized.
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