Obaasan's Boots by Janis Bridger and Lara Jean Okihiro

Charlotte and her mother, Masumi, are travelling from their home in Vancouver to Toronto to visit Masumi's mother- Charlotte's grandmother . On the flight out of British Columbia, Charlotte's mother switches from her Japanese name of Masumi to her English name of Mary, something that both puzzles and annoys Charlotte. Charlotte who is half Japanese, lives with her parents and brother in Vancouver. She also has family in Germany.

At her grandparents home in Toronto, Charlotte meets her many aunts and uncles, and her cousins. Charlotte's cousin, Lou is a year and a half younger and the one she knows the best. Lou, like Charlotte and all their cousins, is half Japanese. She lives in an apartment with her mother, and visits her father and grandparents on evenings and weekends. Lou's Grandma Donnelly lives on a farm outside London, Ontario. 

Both girls have heard their Japanese family talk about the past, when Japanese Canadians were "evacuated" during the war and how they lost everything. In the dining room while eating pan fried salmon, sushi, snow peas with bacon and plain rice, the two girls listen as grandma notes that "...almost everything from back then is gone. Their house, our first home, all our things. It's all gone...lost." 

Lou knows more than Charlotte about what happened but not a lot. She doesn't know the story of her family's past, why they had to move or how everything was lost. During Lou's trip with her father, Koki (Richard) to British Columbia last year, she met family from all over the province and came to realize that this is where her Japanese grandparents are from. The next day Charlotte and Lou arrive at their Japanese grandma's house to help her with her garden which is behind her house. In the garden, Grandma begins telling the story of her family, and that of Charlotte and Lou's. The story flashes back to decades before, beginning in 1928.

Grandma's father came to North America to help build the American railway, while her mother came to Canada to earn money to send home to her family in Kumamoto, Japan where they had an orange farm. After meeting and marrying in Canada, her parents settled on Sea Island located in the Fraser River. When Grandma lived there it was an island dotted with farms. Today it is an airport.

In 1928, and Hisa (Charlotte and Lou's grandma) and her sister Jeanne walk to their school on Sea Island. Their village on the island is small and is both a fishing and cannery town. Hisa's mother works at the  Acme Cannery Company. Their mother saves every penny she can. Hisa's father wants to quit fishing and work for the lumber mill and he wants Hisa to come cook for his work crew so they can send more money back to Japan. Hisa learns from her mother that they send money back to Japan because her family paid for her to come to Canada to earn money to save their farm in Japan. Hisa's mother tells her about the farm back in Japan, the mikan blossoms on the trees in the orchard, the ocean sunsets, and how they would "gather around the table on tatami mats to eat together." 

By 1930, almost everyone in their village works in the cannery. Hisa sometimes works in the cannery on holidays. Her father now has his own fishing boat. Her mother also works at the cannery but the money she earns can only be spent in the company store and can't be sent back to Japan. To earn real money she cooks and cleans for wealthy families on the mainland." and helps harvest crops for local farms.  Hisa's older brother Toshi works at the cannery, while Hisa, Jeanne, Isi and Sam all attend school. Tragedy strikes when Toshi falls ill and dies suddenly from appendicitis. His death is devastating to the family but Hisa's father tells her, "Shikata ga nai" which means "it cannot be helped." 

During the winter of 1930, Hisa's father sells his fishing boat and begins to work full time in the lumber industry. This means working far up the Fraser River and not seeing the family for long periods of time. He has to do this kind of work because there are not many jobs open to Japanese people as they cannot be doctors, lawyers, accountants, or work for the government. Japanese are not even allowed to vote. In the winter of 1932, Hisa and her siblings do their chores, attend school but also take any paid work they can to make up for the loss of Toshi's income. The Great Depression sets in and some families lose their farms. Hisa's father broke his leg and can't come home this year. During the summer of 1932, Hisa and her sister Jeanne work on a strawberry farm up north, picking berries.

In 1933, Hisa finally finishes Grade 8 and school. She won't be attending high school as there is no school nearby. Instead Hisa goes to live with the Bowers in Kerrisdale, to cook, clean and care for their children. The Bowers pay her well and treat her well. Life begins to change with the family (her parents, Jeanne, Takeo, Sam and Isi) only home together on Sundays.  Meanwhile with her parents both working, they are able to buy their first house in 1934 in Marpole in New Westminster across the river from Sea Island.

In the summer of 1939, still living at the Bowers, Hisa is introduced to Koichiro, the cousin of the lady from the Japanese Language School. Koichiro was born in the United States. His  father was a sheriff in Colorado and his mother was a picture bride who came from Japan. Koichiro was sent to Japan to Hiroshima where some of his family still live, to attend school. When his father died,  he returned to New Westminster, to care for his mother and brothers and sisters.

By late 1940, Hisa and Koichiro now engaged, marry on a sunny autumn day. Meanwhile across the ocean in Europe, war rages. They are reminded of this when a parade of soldiers marches down Columbia Street. Hisa and Koichiro move in with his family in New Westminster. In New Westminster, there is a large Japanese community, with a Buddhist Church, a Japanese United Church, Japanese stores, and a Japanese language school. Koichiro and his brother Roy work in the lumber mills, his sister Masako has a dressmaking shop. In the spring Hisa plants a small garden of snow peas, beans and spinach from seeds her mother gave her.

Then in December 1941, with Hisa expecting their first child, they learn the Japanese army has bombed Pearl Harbor, the U.S. naval base in Hawai'i. Hisa, Koichiro and other Japanese Canadians in their community are worried it will be like 1907 again. At that time, nine thousand people stormed Chinatown and Japantown, beating people, looting stores and destroying homes. 

Events move quickly from this point on. The next day all Japanese fishing boats are seized, Japanese schools are closed, and Japanese newspapers shut down. At night lights must be turned off or windows covered with thick black paper. "The lantern at the Japanese War Memorial in Stanley Park was extinguished soon after the bombing, the loyal sacrifice of the Japanese soldiers forgotten." 

Meanwhile Canadian soldiers are sent to fight Germany, Italy and Japan.

 

Before Christmas, anyone of Japanese heritage must register as enemy aliens. In the New Year of 1942, "all men of Japanese origin between eighteen and forty-five years old has to move to labor camps away from the coast." Hisa, pregnant wonders "What will I do without Koichiro? And what will happen to my brothers? Or Roy, the gentle soul who likes to sing and feed the stray black cat...." Then the Canadian government orders everyone of " the Japanese race" including, women, children and the elderly to be "evacuated". 

Expecting her first child, Hisa and her family along with thousands of other Japanese Canadians struggle to understand what this will mean. What will happen to their homes and businesses? What will happen to their sons and husbands and grandfathers? Will their family be separated? When will they be able to return home?

As Charlotte and Lou listen to their grandmother's story, they begin to reconsider their own views on their culture, their identity and how the past has shaped the present and the future.

Discussion

Obaasan's Boots tells the story of one Japanese Canadian family's experience during World War II. After the bombing of Pearl Harbor by the Japanese in December of 1941, Canada moved quickly to declare any person of Japanese heritage as an "enemy alien" and to remove all of their rights to property, employment and to incarcerate them in internment or prison camps.

Cousins Janis Bridger and Lara Jean Okihiro had heard bits and pieces of their family's life during World War II at family get-togethers, but the cousins never really asked questions about the past. When they did, they were told, "Shikata ga nai" or it cannot be helped. Bridger, now a teacher-librarian grew up on the West Coast, apart from her beloved grandparents who had moved away from the West Coast and lived in Toronto. When their grandmother, Hisa Okihiro passed away in 2019, they realized the opportunity to hear her story was lost and might be forgotten, so they set out together to uncover that story by sleuthing through family documents, photographs, archives and directories. What they found was a story of determination, resiliency, and courage in the face of fear, discrimination, and injustice. 

Their research began with the  discovery of  Koichiro and Hisa's wedding guest book. With help from the New Westminster Museum and Archives, they searched censuses and city directories to map their family's past. It was a 1983 newspaper article by Koichiro in The Canada Times that shed light on their family's experiences during the Second World War.

Faced with forced expulsion from their homes in 1942, Koichiro and other Japanese-Canadians formed a group called the New Westminster and District Japanese Housewives Association. Koichiro was secretary of the group whose purpose was to advocate on behalf of their community. In a letter written by Koichiro and  four other men of the Association to local Japanese Canadian families, he outlines what they were experiencing. The five men and five women of the Association advocated for keeping families together and to that end, have them move to an old gold rush town named Kaslo, rather than the dirty, smelly stables of Hastings Park where many other Japanese Canadians were being held.

 Obaasan's Boots  opens with alternating narratives by Charlotte and Lou, two cousins who meet up in Toronto with their families to visit their Japanese grandmother, Hisa Okihiro. As the two cousins are helping their grandmother in her extensive backyard garden, they learn their family story.  Hisa Okihiro tells her granddaughters  Lou and Charlotte what happened to her as young wife and new mother as the Japanese Canadian community of New Westminster were declared enemy aliens, stripped of their property, their civil rights, due process and incarcerated. Hisa's narrative is interspersed between Lou and Charlotte's thoughts about what their beloved grandmother is telling them. 

Hisa's narrative describes what it was like for Japanese Canadians in the prewar period. She tells Charlotte and Lou how they are not allowed to speak Japanese in school and how a slip results in her being punished before her classmates.

The novel describes scenes that are especially heartbreaking: the Ishii family being forced to leave their home immediately when police showed up during dinner and their last views of their home being the still-warm dinner on the table and people breaking into their home, stealing their possessions. Koichiro tells Hisa that he was told their son, Koki must have a  "Canadian name" (he chooses Richard as it is the name of an English king), register their property and entrust all their property and bank accounts to the government with no proof of ownership.  

What must it have been like for Hisa forced to choose between her prized possessions like their family photo albums and her wedding dress, and more practical items like her sewing machine. After learning what happened to the Ishii family, Hisa and Koichiro hide their possessions in their home in built-in bookcases and plaster over them and leave other things stored at the Japanese Language School or the Buddhist Church where they hope they will be safe. As it turns out, the government sells off almost everything, including their home, without their permission. 

It's heartbreaking to learn that all their "furniture stored in the basement of the Buddhist Church was chopped up for firewood less than a year after we left...I think of the beautiful dining room table where I served futomaki to family in our home in New Westminster after our wedding. The curio cabinet where we displayed out tea set from Koichiro's aunt in Japan and other pretty trinkets. These things that made up our lives. Firewood?"

After all of this, Hisa and her family along with her New Westminster community are sent to Kaslo, an old gold rush town, leaving behind almost everything they own. Despite this, Hisa and many of her community find the resiliency and determination to try "to live with purpose" as Hisa describes it. Hisa begins gardening with the help of a kindly neighbour in Kaslo and the Japanese Canadians demonstrate their remarkable resourcefulness and determination by forming schools for their children, as well as many different clubs. Hisa also comes to see the beauty in Kaslo, noting the calming blue of Kootenay Lak, "its shores sprinkled with wild pink sweet peas and indigo chicory flowers."

One interesting aspect of Hisa's narrative is the reaction of the Japanese Canadians to the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Not many historical fiction novels about the internment of Japanese Canadians explore this aspect of the war. Koichiro's family along with aunts and uncles, lived in Hiroshima. Hisa and Koichiro learn that Hiroshima is "completely flattened". When Japan finally surrenders, and Canadians celebrate, Hisa along with other Japanese Canadians are devastated. "But to me, it felt like people were celebrating the deaths of thousands of people. Of Koichiro's family..." At the time, many people felt that the dropping of the atomic bombs was justified. However, with the passage of time, that decision has been called into question, given the tremendous devastation and deaths the bombs caused.

In many respects, the treatment of Japanese Canadians during World War II is reminiscent of the treatment of Indigenous Canadians by the Canadian government and by Canadians. In their Authors' Note at the back of the novel,  Bridger and Okihiro write "We hope remembering this history will help us all be more accepting and work to prevent injustices in the present and future. This is especially important because the treatment of Japanese Canadians during the war is not the only example of those in power in Canada abusing people's rights. We think of the Chinese Head Tax, the Komagata Maru, the demolition of Africville, and most notably, the treatment of the Indigenous Peoples across the land we now call Canada."

Obaasan's Boots offers young readers two perspectives on the Japanese internment: from the Japanese Canadians through Hisa Okihiro's narrative and from the perspective of a younger generation looking back on the history of this event, through Lou and Charlotte's narratives. The authors have these young Canadians posing questions and reactions to Hisa's story that might be asked today. 

Hisa's stories cause Charlotte to re-examine her views on her mother using her Japanese name. "I complain about her Japanese name because all I want to do is fit in." Listening to her grandmother's stories makes her wonder why she doesn't have a Japanese name. And later on, she reconsiders that "Maybe Mom chose to use her Japanese name because she finally could. Maybe she's called Masumi because she wants to honor her family, who suffered so much and didn't have a choice. Maybe choosing her Japanese name is her small way of showing hope. That hearing her Japanese name will make other less common names more accepted as well...And I haven't been very kind to Mom. Masumi, I think is a beautiful name."

For Lou, having to move between the homes of her mother and father is challenging, but learning how her grandmother was able to adapt to living in Kaslo makes her consider that maybe she "...can make things meaningful and comfortable in each place for myself." Lou, who must shuttle between her two divorced parents homes, understands Grandma Okihiro's struggle to find a place to belong. "Maybe what Grandma felt is ore like when you can't go back because things have changed, the place you left doesn't exist the same way anymore."

For both Charlotte and Lou, their grandmother's stories lead them to ask many questions. Lou questions how "Canadian citizens - be forced to live in barns with no toilets or showers, and to eat terrible food?" Charlotte wonders "What would happen if these stories were never told? People silenced, the past forgotten. Would something like this happen again? To a different group of people? In another place or time?"

Obaasan's Boots is a poignant, short novel that successfully brings the reality of the Japanese internment to young readers and asks them to seriously think about what happened over eighty years ago and to consider how they would have responded. Would they have responded with fear? Or with understanding and love like that of Mrs. Beck?

The authors have included several black & white photographs, a Historical Timeline, and a Glossary.

Readers wishing to know more about the internment of Japanese Canadians are encouraged to check out the Landscapes of Justice: The Dispossession of Japanese Canadians (https://loi.uvic.ca/narrative/#)

Book Details:

Obaasan's Boots by Janis Bridger and Lara Jean Okihiro
Toronto: Second Storey Press    2023
160 pp.

Harboring Hope: The True Story of How Henny Sinding Helped Denmark's Jews Escape The Nazis by Susan Hood

Twenty-two-year-old Henny is stealing down the dark streets of Copenhagen, leading a mother and her toddler to a safe house on Strandgade (Strand Street). Along with many other Jewish families, they wait until early morning and the opportunity to race to the lighthouse supply boat waiting on the wharf. That boat, the Gerda III, will carry them across the sea to safety in Sweden. Henny waits until the Nazi guards separate and then cues each adult to cross. The children are carried across after the adults by Henny and another crew member. Once in the Gerda III, the refugees are hidden in the damp, dark hold, behind barrels, cargo and nautical gear.

After submitting to a check by the German guards, and a friendly drink with the Germans, the Gerda sets out, down Christianshavn Canal. Its destination is the Drogden Lighthouse and then onto Sweden to drop off the Jewish passengers. It is a dangerous journey, with German patrols on the bridges, open sea, enemy patrol boats, and underwater mines.

Henny Sinding was born in 1921 in Copenhagen, Denmark, a country led by the beloved monarch, King Christian X. Henny was the middle child of Royal Danish Navy Commander Paul Sinding and his wife Elna (nicknamed Chika). Henny had an older sister Bente and a brother, five years her junior, Carsten. Henny's father was in charge of the Danish Lighthouse and Buoy Service, supervising the Drogden Lighthouse and managing the Gerda III. Henny adored her father and came to share his love of the sea. For the Sindings, having a "good inner moral compass" and being humble were important.

Henny's passions were music and dance and she aspired to attend the Royal Danish Ballet School. This was not acceptable to her parents who did not approve of the lifestyle of dancers, so Henny learned to play the accordion and to step dance. Henny attended N. Zahle's School for Girls. Her best friend was Isse (Annelise) Brune. It was Isse's father who introduced both girls to sailing. Henny soon became a proficient sailor, racing iceboats in winter, learning the Oresund Strait between Denmark and Sweden.

In 1938, when Henny was seventeen, she worked as an au pair in England, learning to speak and read English. She arrived back in Denmark in 1939 with a wider perspective on the world.  In September, 1939, Germany invaded Poland, and Britain declared war on Germany. Denmark had a "non-aggression pact" with Germany, which meant they were at peace. For now.

Henny began working with her father's naval unit, the Danish Lighthouse and Buoy Service in Copenhagen. She was assigned to plot the locations for buoys and lighthouses as well as mapping safety routes. Henny also learned to become a proficient typist. Her work involved a group of close friends, Captain Ejnar Tonnesen, Engineer John Hansen, Gerhardt Steffensen and Otto Andersen.

The crew of the Gerd III set sail every morning bringing mail, books and newspapers to the lighthouse keepers at Drogden Light. It also serviced the buoys that guided ships travelling between the Baltic and North Seas. 

In 1940, when Henny was eighteen years old, the Nazis invaded Denmark on April 9 at 4:15AM. The German invasion, Operation Weserubung was over by 6AM. King Christian X agreed to cooperate as long as Denmark's right to freedom of religion was respected. Germany desired a peaceful occupation of Denmark as this meant the need for fewer soldiers to police the country. While the Dane's ran the country, the Nazis controlled agriculture and industry and set about fortifying the coastline.

Henny and Bente and their father continued to work, the Gerda III continued to sail, but life was more difficult. The Danes were not friendly to their Nazi occupiers and they wondered what would happen to Denmark's Jewish citizens. More than eight thousand Jews lived peacefully in Denmark, accepted in the country and thriving. Hitler attempted to force the Danish government and people to follow his orders but politicians resigned and students protested. King Christian X agreed to cooperate as long as Denmark's right to freedom of religion was respected.

In 1941,  the Nazis began to implement their "final solution" to the Jewish problem: murder and extermination. The attempt to have Danish Jews wear the Yellow Star failed and the Danish resistance grew. Medical students, and physicians joined the resistance movement, student unrest was country-wide. Knud Peterson and his older brother Jens, along with a cousin and two friends formed a club, the RAF club to fight back. A group of men formed the Holger Danske, named after a knight of Danish legend. 

In September of 1942, King Christian refused to acknowledge Hitler's birthday greeting in a way that the Fuhrer expected. And so the Germans replaced their white glove approach with that of an iron fist. After another year of demonstrations, sabotage and strikes, in August of 1943, Danish workers went on strike. Then on August 29, with Operation Safari, the Nazis attempted to capture the Danish navy. But the Danes had anticipated this and scuttled many of their warships, torpedo boats and submarines. Eventually Henny came to meet Jorgen Kieler, a medical student and Erik Koch Michelsen or Mix, a naval cadet. All were interested in actively resisting the Nazis. 

Werner Best, Hitler's man in Denmark, was struggling to subdue the increasing Danish resistance. To regain Hitler's favour, Best decided to suggest that they roundup all of Denmark's Jews. Hitler was pleased with this plan and the date was set: Friday, October 1, 1943, the end of the second day of Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year and the Shabbat Shuvah. It was a truly evil plan because most Jews would be at home and therefore, easily captured.

The Danes had three days to save their Jewish friends and neighbours. Henny along with Jorgen, Mix and hundreds of others sprang into action. Using the Gerda III, Henny set to work planning just how the boat and its brave crew could save hundreds of Jews and transport them to safety in neutral Sweden.

Discussion

Author Susan Hood tells the story of Henny Sinding and the Danish resistance mostly through the use of free verse. Henny's story is one of incredible courage, perseverance and a touch of luck, as work in the Danish resistance was dangerous.

In Harboring Hope, Henny Sinding and the crew of the lighthouse supply boat, Gerda III worked tirelessly to save as many Jews as possible, after the Nazis decided to implement the first part of their "final solution" which was to round up all of Denmark's Jews and transport them to the concentration camps on the continent. They had three days to devise a plan, locate their Jewish neighbours who had gone into hiding, learn who to trust, hide them and then get them to safety. This required planning, organization, courage and determination, all of which Henny Sinding had in abundance.

The crew of the Gerda needed the permission of Henny's father, who was in charge of the Danish Lighthouse and Buoy Service. Twenty-two-year old Henny was able to obtain his permission to not only use the Gerda but also to relocate it simply by asking her father not to notice the boat's different sailing route. With the help of a naval cadet nicknamed Mix, and a medical student, Jorgen and his resistance group, as well as others in the underground, Henny helped locate Danish Jews,  shelter and eventually lead them onto the Gerda which then ferried them to safety in Sweden. Henny's group was able to save around three hundred people.

Harboring Hope realistically portrays life in Denmark during World War II. The Danish, unable to effectively fight the mighty German military machine, at first settled into an uneasy coexistence. Soon resistance to the Nazis grew. Hood includes several notable Danish citizens who felt deeply motivated to fight back against the Germans, including many young teens who were ashamed of their country's weak response. One was Knud Pederson and his Churchill Club. In 1940, fourteen-year-old Pederson was inspired by the resistance of the Norwegians to the Nazis. Initially he and his brother Jens along with other friends formed a club called the RAF club which undertook small acts of sabotage. When he moved to Aalborg, he formed a new club, the Churchill Club which became more deeply involved in fighting the Nazis.

Through many different forms of poetry, Hood is able to convey Henny Sinding's remarkable courage, determination and levelheadedness as well as her ability to organize. She became the focal point around which the crew of the Gerda III could effectively outwit the Nazis and really contribute to helping their Jewish countrymen.

The novel is divided into nineteen parts and employs mostly free verse to tell Henny's story. However,  in her Poetry Notes, the author writes that she also wrote other forms such as a shape poem, a sensory poem, an  ABC poem, a triolet, a nonet and elegy. Hood writes that various "poetic techniques, such as alliteration, anaphora, assonance, onomatopoeia, refrains and rhythms" were also used. This variety adds interest and aids in the storytelling.

Harboring Hope is another excellent novel by author Susan Hood. She provides her readers with a large amount of supplemental information at the back of the novel in a part titled Ship's Log. In this part there is More About Henny, Gerda III, and the Escape of the Danish Jews, Homecoming which provides information on the return of the Jews in the post-war period, What Happened to Gerda III?, Photographs which include photos of Henny, her parents, Nazis in Copenhagen, the Gerda III, and Mix, Poetry Notes, Sources, a Bibliography, and an extensive source for Quotes used in the book.

Book Details:

Harboring Hope: The True Story of How Henny Sinding Helped Denmark's Jews Escape The Nazis by Susan Hood
New York: HarperCollins Publishers    2023

352 pp.

Two Tribes by Emily Bowen Cohen

Mia Harjo Horowitz attends West Hill Jewish Community School . She and her best friend, Chloe are eating lunch when a fellow student, Justin asks Mia if she is Spanish. Annoyed, Mia tells him her father is American Indian. He then questions her as to whether she wears beads, can ride a horse or has a secret Indian name. As Mia has none of these, she wonders if she is not really Indian.

This leads Mia to wonder how she can claim to be Native if she knows nothing about Indian culture. She can't ask her Jewish mother because she doesn't like talking about Mia's father. And her father lives in Oklahoma with his new family. Mia and Chloe decide that maybe Mia can find "a book about being Native American at the library". 

At home, Mia helps her mother make challah in preparation for Shabbat on Friday night. Mia, her mother and her stepfather Roger also have Rabbi and Rebbetzin Goldfarb over the Shabbat. He helped prepare Mia for her Bat Mitvah recently. However, Mia tells her mother that she is not just Jewish, and that the students at school act as though she is different.

Not understanding her feelings, the Rabbi makes a rude joke about Indians, further upsetting Mia. Her father, Van, is a member of the Muscogee Nation. Mia's mother tells the Rabbi and his wife that Van was not true to his vows and that he now lives in Oklahoma with his new family.

When Mia receives another a cheque from her Van and his wife Sharon, she decides she might have enough money to fly to Tulsa to see her father. She will prove her dad is a good guy and that he loves her. She will also learn how to be a real Indian. However, when she tells Chloe her plan, her friend tells her that flying won't be an option if she isn't planning to tell her mother about the trip. 

With the help of Chloe, Mia plans a secret trip to Tulsa. She lies to her mother, getting her to sign a permission slip for a weekend trip with classmates, praying in synagogue, and getting her to agree to spending the night at Chloe's home. But instead of boarding the bus with her classmates, Mia hires a taxi and gets on a bus to Oklahoma. While her impromptu trip helps Mia discover in Native American identity, her deception has major repercussions for her and her extended family, highlighting issues of trust and honesty. 

Discussion

In Two Tribes, author Emily Bowen Cohen explores themes of identity, forgiveness, acceptance and reconciliation. Cohen, who is Muscogee and Jewish like her main character Mia, experienced separation from her father's Indigenous family after his death when she was nine-years-old. Fortunately for Cohen, her mother made sure that she continued to learn her Indigenous culture.

Unlike the author, in Two Tribes, Mia has little contact with her Indigenous father who lives in Oklahoma. This is the result of her parents bitter divorce: her mother's unresolved anger towards Mia's father for his infidelity and her father's self-absorbed focus on his problems and his new life. This means Mia learns only about her Jewish culture and its beautiful traditions while her Native culture is ignored. But Mia develops the desire to learn about her other "tribe", her Indigenous culture that comes from her father when she is questioned at school as to whether she is adopted. This is the "seed" that leads to Mia questioning her identity.

Correctly suspecting that her mother is unlikely to allow her to visit her father, Mia does so surreptitiously which eventually has repercussions. However, that visit to her father's home allows her the opportunity to learn about her Native culture and beliefs.

Cohen wonderfully juxtaposes Mia's Jewish and Indigenous heritages through the descriptions of food, dress and stories. At home, Mia makes challah with her mother for Shabbat. When she visits her father, she makes wild onion eggs with her cousin Nova, eats fry bread, and attends a pow wow. Mia learns about Indigenous regalia and is told the creation story of the clans. Mia also discovers that her Indigenous and Jewish cultures have something in common: the stomp dance is a form a worship done around a ceremonial fire, while in Judaism there is an eternal flame in synagogues. When she is back in Los Angeles, Mia also begins to realize that she could blend both Jewish and Indigenous food. She tells Chole, "Maybe Native American and Jewish traditions can blend together as one."

Of course there are consequences to Mia's deception as both she and Chloe are punished.  After returning home, Mia is made to sit with Rabbi G and talk about what happened but this also turns into an opportunity for more growth for both Mia, her parents and the Rabbi. Telling the adults what is really in her heart, Mia explains that she is a separate person, she's not her father and she will not always make the same choices her mother has made. She tells her mother and Roger, "I'm not just a Bat Mitzvah though, because I'm also Native American. I'm a member of two tribes."  Mia also explains that in travelling to Oklahoma to visit her father, she was honouring him. This had not occurred to Rabbi G who also comes to realize how offensive his "joke" was to Mia. Happily, Mia's actions result in the reconciliation between her parents and potential for more exploration of her Native American identity.

Two Tribes acknowledges and portrays the very real struggles young people can experience growing up in two cultures. The use of the graphic novel format is very effective in portraying the two "tribes" that constitute Mia's identity because there is a visual component to her dual ethnicity. Mia looks different than most of her Jewish classmates: her darker skin leads classmates to wonder if she is adopted. The vibrant panels portray this much more effectively than words do, allowing the reader to better identify with Mia. Illustrations were done by Cohen, rendered in ink, brush, Micron pen and Photoshop with colours by Lark Pien.

Book Details:

Two Tribes by Emily Bowen Cohen

New York: Heartdrum, an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers    2023