2005 Newbery winner, Kira-Kira by Cynthia Kadohata (2005) is about Japanese-American sisters Katie and Lynn who move to the South in the 1970s with their baby brother and under-employed parents. The title means sparkling or shimmering, a term about beautiful things that are both seen through and reflective (the sky, eyes, the sea). At it’s heart, it’s a story about the relationship between the sisters as Lynn gets sicker and sicker with untreatable cancer and their parents desperately work under terrible conditions in a chicken processing plant in the South to try and earn enough to care for their family.
What I liked. I loved the sweet ways the siblings often treated each other and worked for one another. In many ways, the harder parts of the book were when Katie was at odds with her siblings more than even the many horrible external things her family was going through.
What was interesting . The little stories within the big story were some of the quirkiest and funniest parts of the book. Katie has an imaginary boyfriend she calls Joe John Abondondalarama, which is such a fantastic name that a pre-teen would make up for a boy. Or the very odd stories about their uncle and his wife were so odd but also exactly the kind of weird thing that happens in families. One of the images that has stayed with me is also the story about the mother not being allowed bathroom breaks in the chicken factory and needing to wear a pad/diaper and not always having time to change before she has to deal with something right after work. That is the kind of detail of inhumane treatment that somehow makes all the big and terrible abuses come alive and stay with you; it’s as if somehow your brain can’t handle too much abuse and horror, but a small detail like that breaks through the defenses in your brain and cuts to your heart.
What were some limitations. This story is bleak. There is a lot of hardship, both small and large, that the family is dealing with. I think that it was probably too much for a middle grade novel, in terms of having both very difficult external circumstances (poverty, racism, life-threatening illness) alongside the relational challenges of Katie feeling not overly connected at times to her family. Especially, the strain on her relationship with Lynn is very real and raw, but makes this more of a way to inform kids about hard things than to allow them to enter into the book feeling both safe and challenged.
Similarity to other Newbery winners. It reminded me a little of the complex sister relationship in Jacob Have I Loved, and Summer of the Swans, although in other ways the strength of the family in hard times reminds me of Dicey’s Song and Miracles on Maple Hill. In terms of its take on Southern poverty and racism, it was more like Roll of Thunder Hear My Cry. In terms of dealing with the death of a close loved one more like Bridge to Terabithia, Out of the Dust and A Gathering of Days: A New England Girl’s Journal. (In terms of very bleak Newberies it’s probably not as rough as Out of the Dust, The Slave Dancer, or M. C. Higgins, the Great but it’s probably in the top five depressing and bleak Newberies–although of course all of those are important introductions to extremely difficult topics and historical situations.) And while there have been Newberies about Asian characters in Asia (A Single Shard, Young Fu of the Upper Yangtze, and Shen of the Sea, this is the first book to talk about Asian-Americans and the Asian immigrant experience.
What it teaches me as a writer. I think the strength of this novel comes through in its vignettes–the little snapshots of humor, love, tragedy or honor. I think that practice of stopping and making little sections hold up together is important, and something I hope that I can do as well.
Have you read Kira-Kira? What are your favorite stories that center on two sisters?
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