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ap2009's review
dark
emotional
mysterious
sad
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.25
kdurham2's review
3.0
Check out the full review at Kritters Ramblings
A set of Japanese twins are the focus of the book and a narrative on the side centers around a young Japanese woman who upon marrying is whisked away and is having to live a life she never pictured far away from what she knew.
I loved the historical storyline so much. Lillie is an orphaned Japanese child who is adopted and raised by a white couple. She ends up marrying a Japanese man and is quickly ingrained in his family who don't even speak English. The few quick chapters that I read of Lillie and Donald were just so interesting. I was so intrigued by her wonderment of how she defined herself and where she felt she belonged. I could see her struggle to fit in even though she looked the part, but wasn't raised with the history of the Japanese culture. I wanted so much more of their story in this book.
A set of Japanese twins are the focus of the book and a narrative on the side centers around a young Japanese woman who upon marrying is whisked away and is having to live a life she never pictured far away from what she knew.
I loved the historical storyline so much. Lillie is an orphaned Japanese child who is adopted and raised by a white couple. She ends up marrying a Japanese man and is quickly ingrained in his family who don't even speak English. The few quick chapters that I read of Lillie and Donald were just so interesting. I was so intrigued by her wonderment of how she defined herself and where she felt she belonged. I could see her struggle to fit in even though she looked the part, but wasn't raised with the history of the Japanese culture. I wanted so much more of their story in this book.
graff_fuller's review against another edition
challenging
dark
emotional
mysterious
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
Dual storylines with a non-linear story. It took some time to get into the story...and to see the need for the two time periods and how they effect each other.
The use of alternate names is sometime confusing, but is part of the uniqueness of this story.
The treatment of people of Japanese origin, though American citizens and even American born...it reprehensible. This type period is truly a black mark on the US and how it has treated its citizens. Not good.
Obviously, the framework that this story uses, makes you think ONE thing, while something else is going on. You can/do make up your mind, to later understand how hasty you were.
There are very few evil people in this story, though at the beginning you think there are loads more.
I really enjoyed this story and the voices within it.
The use of alternate names is sometime confusing, but is part of the uniqueness of this story.
The treatment of people of Japanese origin, though American citizens and even American born...it reprehensible. This type period is truly a black mark on the US and how it has treated its citizens. Not good.
Obviously, the framework that this story uses, makes you think ONE thing, while something else is going on. You can/do make up your mind, to later understand how hasty you were.
There are very few evil people in this story, though at the beginning you think there are loads more.
I really enjoyed this story and the voices within it.
puzzleguzzler's review
3.0
Challenging but worthwhile.
Some clever alternating storytelling of twin sisters and their Japanese American mother who experienced the worst parts of the war in both countries.
Many parts of the novel were narrated in second person which effective, but also hard to get a good rhythm with the style.
Although this novel was published prior, the sister themes reminded me of Sisters by Daisy Johnson.
Some clever alternating storytelling of twin sisters and their Japanese American mother who experienced the worst parts of the war in both countries.
Many parts of the novel were narrated in second person which effective, but also hard to get a good rhythm with the style.
Although this novel was published prior, the sister themes reminded me of Sisters by Daisy Johnson.
phona's review
1.0
the only things I liked about this book were the beginning and synopsis. after that, I wanted to dnf but I read the rest because I wanted to see how bizarre the ending would be. it wasn't bizarre, just kinda predictable imo.
you'd think with books, every chapter should have a purpose. here, I couldn't tell what was intended; there was no clear purpose. Lillie's story seemed a bit unnecessary and the associated twist was something I knew from the get-go. idk. the writing was beautiful, but there was no plot and the book moved slower than snails could dream of. it was also incredibly convoluted and confusing at times. anw.
you'd think with books, every chapter should have a purpose. here, I couldn't tell what was intended; there was no clear purpose. Lillie's story seemed a bit unnecessary and the associated twist was something I knew from the get-go. idk. the writing was beautiful, but there was no plot and the book moved slower than snails could dream of. it was also incredibly convoluted and confusing at times. anw.
jamiereadsbooks's review
3.0
SHADOW CHILD is a dark and twisty story about family, identity, trauma, and inheritance. Part thriller, part family drama, part historical fiction, I was intrigued by the relationship between twin sisters, Kei and Hana, from the very beginning. Although the shifting narrarators made the story lack cohesion at times, I do think the story ultimately landed on its feet because THAT ENDING, GUYS. Solid ⭐⭐⭐ stars for me.
karabk's review
3.0
Hana & Kei are both melancholy, complicated girls. Theirs is a sisterhood based on competition for their mother's approval, and misunderstandings from incidents throughout their childhood.
Lilian's story is full of drama, turmoil and torture. I rooted for her to return to the US, but then she isolated herself and was bedridden in Hawaii due to her Hiroshima experience.
My full review is on: https://booksbargainsandbrands.blogspot.com/
Lilian's story is full of drama, turmoil and torture. I rooted for her to return to the US, but then she isolated herself and was bedridden in Hawaii due to her Hiroshima experience.
My full review is on: https://booksbargainsandbrands.blogspot.com/
davidwright's review
3.0
As Hanako Swanson returns to her New York City apartment building, she startles a man who does a double take upon seeing her. Her sparse rooms seem to have been torn apart, and lying bruised and unconscious in her bathtub is her estranged identical twin sister, Keiko. Rahna Reiko Rizzuto’s “Shadow Child” starts with a bang, and yet these events are among the more minor traumas endured by the three women whose interwoven narratives make up this intensely emotional family saga.
In the earliest of these stories, the twins’ Japanese-American mother, Lillie, is abandoned in infancy on the doorstep of the preacher of a small farming town, where she is destined to be a racial anomaly. She marries second-generation nisei Donald on the brink of the U.S. entry into World War II, and is two months pregnant with his son when the couple is stripped of their possessions and interned at Manzanar as enemy aliens.
Speaking no Japanese and desperately alone among what her former compatriots insist are “her kind,” Lillie is further alienated when her husband’s family manages to get them repatriated to a homeland where she has never set foot. In Japan, she is put to work translating shortwave radio broadcasts from the Allies, stranded with other nisei girls far from home, enduring wartime privations, kept separate from her son and husband, and fatefully taking up residence in the prefecture of Hiroshima.
In the years to come, her daughters can hardly imagine the ghosts that haunt their mother’s distracted brain, and her harrowing odyssey is merely glimpsed through the autobiographical fairy tales that she tells the twins. They don’t even know her real name. To them, as to the town, she is Miya Swanson, the town’s crazy Calrose Rice lady, dressed in clothes fashioned from discarded rice sacks.
Neither can they truly know their own names, for their mother indiscriminately refers to both daughters as Koko. When either girl is being especially good, she calls them Hanako. If they need discipline, they become Keiko. Gradually we learn how the sisters struggle their way toward more or less fixed identities as awkward good girl Hana and rebellious bad seed Kei. Much later they will learn the true source and significance of their adopted names, and the terrible burden of their painful inheritance.
The twins face their own challenges growing up as hapa haole or half-white, the “privileged and damned creatures of mixed race” amid the delusory melting pot of Hawai’i. The rivalry between these bullied outcasts unfolds against the perilous beauty of the islands, where plumeria blossoms rot luxuriously underfoot, molten lava cools into hazardous caves of razor-sharp obsidian, and devastating tidal waves gather and approach inexorably from half a world away.
Spanning 30 years, the story of these three strong, scarred women’s endurance and quest for belonging is conveyed with painful urgency, grave foreboding and no small measure of suspense.
In the earliest of these stories, the twins’ Japanese-American mother, Lillie, is abandoned in infancy on the doorstep of the preacher of a small farming town, where she is destined to be a racial anomaly. She marries second-generation nisei Donald on the brink of the U.S. entry into World War II, and is two months pregnant with his son when the couple is stripped of their possessions and interned at Manzanar as enemy aliens.
Speaking no Japanese and desperately alone among what her former compatriots insist are “her kind,” Lillie is further alienated when her husband’s family manages to get them repatriated to a homeland where she has never set foot. In Japan, she is put to work translating shortwave radio broadcasts from the Allies, stranded with other nisei girls far from home, enduring wartime privations, kept separate from her son and husband, and fatefully taking up residence in the prefecture of Hiroshima.
In the years to come, her daughters can hardly imagine the ghosts that haunt their mother’s distracted brain, and her harrowing odyssey is merely glimpsed through the autobiographical fairy tales that she tells the twins. They don’t even know her real name. To them, as to the town, she is Miya Swanson, the town’s crazy Calrose Rice lady, dressed in clothes fashioned from discarded rice sacks.
Neither can they truly know their own names, for their mother indiscriminately refers to both daughters as Koko. When either girl is being especially good, she calls them Hanako. If they need discipline, they become Keiko. Gradually we learn how the sisters struggle their way toward more or less fixed identities as awkward good girl Hana and rebellious bad seed Kei. Much later they will learn the true source and significance of their adopted names, and the terrible burden of their painful inheritance.
The twins face their own challenges growing up as hapa haole or half-white, the “privileged and damned creatures of mixed race” amid the delusory melting pot of Hawai’i. The rivalry between these bullied outcasts unfolds against the perilous beauty of the islands, where plumeria blossoms rot luxuriously underfoot, molten lava cools into hazardous caves of razor-sharp obsidian, and devastating tidal waves gather and approach inexorably from half a world away.
Spanning 30 years, the story of these three strong, scarred women’s endurance and quest for belonging is conveyed with painful urgency, grave foreboding and no small measure of suspense.