Summer of the Big Bachi

Naomi Hirahara is a talented writer and a gifted storyteller. She draws you into a world you might think you knew but that feels foreign from the viewpoint of the main characters. Japanese gardeners have been so commonplace, yet very uncommon in American society. To see this country through their eyes is very humbling. This story makes you realize what courage and hard work it takes to make it here as someone perceived as "different." The author lets us glimpse the interesting personalities of her characters and how these protagonists figure out ways to survive together. The story is suspenseful with full character development. And the praise one feels for the main characters evolves through subtle description. At the end of the story your heart is touched by poignant acts of friendship and gentle charm.

Masao Arai is an aging Japanese gardener in Los Angeles who's just barely making it. He's also one of the several hundred American-born Japanese who was in Hiroshima in August 1945, an experience from which he will never, ever escape. He's not an important man by anyone's standards, he's not even very involved in anyone else's affairs (now that his wife is dead of cancer and his semi-estranged daughter has gone off to New York to be a film maker), but he has a few friends and many acquaintances among the other Japanese and Nisei in LA. One of them is a man known as Joji Haneda, whom he knew in Hiroshima, whom Mas has avoided seeing again for a couple of decades, because Joji is not what he appears. Now a young Japanese reporter, the grandson of a woman Mas also used to know, has turned up asking probing questions. And a local woman dies, with the grandson being blamed. And other Japanese are poking around, making trouble for Mas and his friends, and all the things Mas wants not to remember are coming back to haunt him -- especially about what happened to Joji Haneda. This book is marketed as a "mystery," but Mas isn't a detective. He doesn't even think of what he's doing as solving a crime; he just has to make amends. ("Bachi" is the avenging spirit of retribution; "what goes around comes around.") This is one of those involving, absorbing stories that stays with you for weeks after you finish the book and put it back on the shelf. The characters are very fully realized, the Japanese under-community is brought completely to life, and the most ordinary, unheroic people show the depths of themselves. An amazing book.

I picked this book up in the mystery section of my local library when I was looking for a fun summer read. Imagine my delighted surprise when I instead encountered a deep, complex novel exploring all of the great human themes: love, obligation, betrayal, loss, and redemption. It is set against an accurate portrayal of a sub-culture of L.A. most of us never see. Highly recommended. My only concern is the apparent intention to make the protagonist into one of those serial mystery sleuths. He seems too uniquely suited to the history and situations in this book to be credibly trotted out for repeated triumphs.

This book opens a window onto the lifeways and outlooks of an older generation of Japanese Americans in Los Angeles, told through the story of an unlikely protagonist, Mas Arai, a man of few words but strong convictions. Hirahara conveys a realistic, detailed sense of this subculture, giving the reader a sense of "being there." I enjoyed the rich descriptions of the "community hangout" (a rundown lawnmower shop), the seedy gambling joints, and the humble homes of Altadena, and getting a feel for how these folks related to each other and the world around them. I felt like I was eavesdropping on a community I knew little about, before this book. A great read, highly recommended.

Over fifty years have passed since the Americans dropped the first atomic bomb on Hiroshima. During the subsequent five plus decades the world has dramatically changed as Japan and the United States are allies with an economic rivalry as two of the most powerful nations on the globe.Numerous Japanese survivors of the Hiroshima debacle have lived and still reside in Los Angeles. This included until recently gardener Joji Haneda, who died less than a month ago in a Ventura County hospital. Two Japanese visitors were seeking out Joji. Shine magazine writer Yuki Kimura wanted to ask him about what happened to Yuki's vanished grandfather Riki Kimura just after the bomb fell, something he believed Joji had known. Working for a client, private eye Shuji Nakane wanted to question Joji for information on a stolen classic 1956 Ford pickup. However, Yuki will learn the stunning truth about 1945 and his lost grandfather, but also ends up arrested for murder.The intrigue surrounding Hiroshima at the time of the bomb and the insightful look at the Japanese-American subculture in Southern California overwhelm the mystery. The cast is strong especially the two visitors and the three conspiratorial friends hiding the past including perceptions of Joji. Though the mystery behind what happened to Riki seems minor, fans of astute looks at subcultures within the so called American melting pot will appreciate Naomi Hirahara's delightful debut.Harriet Klausner