the main problem that I have with this author's attempt to make a manual paperback piece of literature is the fact that they failed to recognize the analysis from the different reviews on this section of the interweb. Many critiques of this piece, including mine, were disregarded and the author of this given piece, for some reason decided to make a sequel. This "book" was incredibly mundane. I have seen dozens of reviews saying the same thing as me and yet the author of the piece completely disregards these critiques and decides to make another book that nobody wants to read. As a very serious critic, I am completely baffled by the fact that somebody would ever write something as terrible as this. As a literary critic, I am deeply offended and I find this to be an absolute "fuck you" to the literature community. The author deserves to be prosecuted for making such a horrible "book".

- Gregory McGregor

A bit too light and wispy? Our narrator is very fond of looking at the scenery and only shyly alluding to the human rights abuses going on all around her.

But ... crucial reading ... I'd liked to hope Japanese internment was only a mad USA thing. Canada! Part of the Empire! Bloody hell.

With The Awakening, this book is a keystone at the bottom of my "Hated High School Required Reading" pile. My largest peeve with it (and other high-school-assigned literature) is that it is slated for the required reading list based almost entirely on its extrinsic qualities. It's written well-enough, but it isn't anything to demand much notice. Instead, it's its treatment of Japanese persecution during World War II that warrants its read. Fair enough, but I think historical lessons should be taught in history class; English should focus mainly on the writing that has most influenced literature. Sad to say, for me, this is not one of them.

The story was fine, but it was hard to discern between flashbacks and the present day. This isn't a good novel for young readers unless they have strong reading skills and are willing to shovel through a book when they're not understanding it.

This is a semi autobiographical novel about the Japanese-Canadian people during WWII. The narrator's family lived along the west coast of British Columbia for several generations before the war. They were primarily in the fishing industry. When the US entered the war after Pearl Harbor these people were all stripped of their property, their livelihoods, and sent to camps and small towns. Canada was different from the US in extending this exile and making it even worse decades after the war ended. People who were in camps in BC during the war were sent to the sugar beet fields of Alberta and it was several decades before people of Japanese descent were allowed back on the west coast. It was a beautiful and heart breaking story.

I prefer books that have writing that is a little more adventurous than this. I did like the way the narrator's memories of the war were revealed a little at a time along with documents her relatives left to her.

Jeeeeesus christ.
I'd never heard of this book before having to read it for the Intro to Literature class I'm TAing for this term. Not sure how, actually, because turns out it's a Canadian classic (I'll blame it on my Quebec upbringing), and with good reason: it's important, but not only that, it's good. It takes the Japanese-Canadian narrative in World War II (in all its mindblowing horror), and renders it emotionally and, at times, quite poetically. It's a heartbreaking book, particularly when you realize the story isn't going to end without visiting the other side of the Pacific.

3.5 stars, and recommended CanLit reading.

It seems almost offensive to rate Obasan four stars. Its subject matter is important, and I feel it deeply. This is a quiet yet passionate retelling—fictional characters, I believe, but real events—events that tore apart lives and families. Trauma is juxtaposed with simple, everyday life. It was an everyday life that we might call oppressive, but to the main character, it was ordinary. The Globe and Mail describes it as "the calm recitation of events that destroyed families, a culture and a way of life." In this story, silence is both the saviour and the enemy.

Obasan is a heart-wrenching, eye-opener about the oppression that Japanese Canadians experienced in Canada during the second world war together with the bombings in Japan. I rated it only four stars because it was hard for me to get into at times. It was teeming with metaphor. The entire novel was perhaps half metaphor and half not. To be sure, it had a rare sort of beauty, but much of it was complex and unconventionally-worded, and it went over my head. I also had a hard time keeping straight who was who and related to whom. Sometimes I would read back over whole paragraphs to get a grasp of the relationships, but it was hard for me to retain those connections, and I was bound to get confused later in the book.

I don’t want anyone to start this book expecting something fast-paced and contemporary. I want everyone who reads it to understand that what they're opening is a real literary work. If you're expectations are accurate, I believe will fully appreciate Obasan for the masterpiece that it is.

J'ai eu du mal à rentrer dans l'histoire, et j'ai failli lâcher à plusieurs reprises. Si tout ce qui a trait à la ségrégation à l'encontre des Japonais et Canadiens d'origine japonaise était extrêmement intéressant et poignant, la narration est entrecoupée de passages plus oniriques ou terre-à-terre où l'héroïne raconte ses souvenirs d'enfance notamment, et qui ont peiné à me convaincre.
Je suis néanmoins contente d'être allée au bout de ce récit, qui éclaire un pan ignoré (pour moi) de l'histoire canadienne pendant la seconde guerre mondiale, alors que je connaissais le versant américain.

Simply a beautiful piece of writing.

4.5/5*

What can I say?
Quietly and unassumingly profound. Heart wrenching.. One to read

More of a 3.5

Was a good book, but I feel like some parts were too full of metaphors/similies. I really liked the bits with Aunt Emily.