“Pearl”
By Sherri Smith, illustrated by Christine Norrie.
Scholastic, New York, 2024, 133 pages, Grades 5-7.
Racism is a sickness that afflicts many societies. In times of peace, it many times lies beneath the surface, but erupts during times of societal conflict. It usually begins by making a certain group a “them,” and not part of “us.” Having dehumanized the group, it allows them to be attacked or persecuted.
After the Pearl Harbor attack in 1941, the Roosevelt Administration implements a horrific racist attack on Japanese-American citizens on the West Coast. A small number of Japanese American leaders in Hawaii are arrested but most Japanese-Americans in Hawaii are left alone. The Roosevelt Administration is smart enough to see that the Hawaiian economy will collapse without the Japanese-American workforce. This is not true on the West Coast. There the Japanese-Americans are rounded up, stripped of their civil rights, robbed of their property and then sent to internment camps. Sherri Smith writes this provocative graphic novel about one Japanese-American girl caught up in World War II. The name of this touching, sad and hopeful story is “Pearl.”
Amy is born in Hawaii and lives a normal American life. She has Anglo friends and is interested in movies and hair styles. She comes home one day and is told that her grandmother is ill and she needs to go to Japan to take care of the older lady. Amy doesn’t want to go. She is bilingual but acts and thinks like an American. Reluctantly, she goes to Japan in September 1941. In Japan, Amy faces discrimination and is derogatorily called a Nisei (second generation Japanese-American). This hurts the girl and makes her feel like she is both strange and unlikeable. Her grandmother helps her to understand her new world and Amy begins to fit into the extended family. Everything changes Dec. 7,1941.
Following the Hawaiian attack, Japanese authorities suspect Amy of not being loyal to Japan. They force her to translate American messages from radio broadcasts. Soon she discovers that the American government has sent more than 120,000 Japanese-Americans to internment camps. While racial hatred against Japanese-Americans rises across the United States, Amy is completely confused about what to do. She has no choice but to translate the American broadcasts. The girl feels like a traitor to the United States, but hates the brutal treatment of the American government wreaks on her people.
The Japanese Imperial Army moves Amy and several other Nisei girls to Hiroshima to continue their translating work. The war goes badly for Japan. Then one day, the atom bomb is dropped on Hiroshima. What happens to Amy and the citizens of Hiroshima?
How does Amy respond to all the terrible things that are inflicted on her? How does she still learn to hope for a better future? Why does love conquer death? To find the answers to these and other questions, go to the library and check out “Pearl” by Sherri Smith.
President Jimmy Carter formed a commission to study what caused the imprisonment of the Japanese-Americans. Its conclusion was that racial hatred had caused the incarceration. The commission recommended monetary reparations be given to the living survivors of the internment camps. President Ronald Reagan authorized the payment of $20,000 to the survivors of the camps. The American government stated fear, racism and the failure of the Roosevelt administration caused this tragedy. Sherri Smith writes about the cost of the war and effects of Japanese and American racial prejudices during World War II.
I highly recommend this powerful, brilliantly graphic novel to help us to avoid making the same disastrous decisions of the Roosevelt administration. The novel is heartbreaking, poignant and hopeful. It is a great read.
