A review by annreadsabook
Mika in Real Life by Emiko Jean

medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.75

35-year-old Mika is stumbling through life, just barely making ends meet, and abashedly asking for money from her disappointed parents when she receives an unexpected call—from the daughter, Penny, she gave up for adoption 16 years ago. Eager to impress Penny, Mika makes up a little white lie…then another…then another…until she finds herself scrambling to fabricate the life she wishes she had when Penny reveals she plans to visit Mika.

While MIKA IN REAL LIFE addresses very real issues about parenthood, adoption, and life/career in your mid-thirties, Emiko Jean injects moments of levity throughout. Jean’s book considers the sacrifices we make to achieve certain versions of ourselves—Mika has gone so long sacrificing everything she loved to pursue a version of herself that was palatable to her parents, but is the cost more than she can bear? Lots of interesting discussions of parent-child dynamics: on the one hand, Mika tries to build up a “fake” life to impress her daughter, and on the other, Mika tries to deal with the fact that her parents are almost always disappointed in her. I liked the ways that Jean grappled with the feeling of being a thirty-something who is still grasping for a sense of meaning in life when everything around you says you should’ve figured it out by now—in other words, it feels like life is passing you by.

I did have questions about the representation of transracial adoption in this book. I am not an adoptee, so I defer to transracial adoptees who have read this book. But there were moments in which I felt troubled by the fairly forgiving portrayal of Penny’s white adoptive parents, even in one instance where Penny’s adoptive mother threw essentially an adult temper tantrum when confronted with the idea of connecting Penny with her Japanese heritage.
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