Monday, March 27, 2023

#11 [2023/CBR13] Tokyo Rose - Zero Hour by Andre R. Frattino, Kate Kasenow, and Janice Chiang

Looking for another book to read, I searched through NPR's Best Books List for something new and found another graphic novel. Tokyo Rose - Zero Hour: A Japanese American Woman's Persecution and Ultimate Redemption after World War II (2022) by Andre R. Frattino, Kate Kasenow, and Janice Chiang.

This graphic novel is about Iva Toguri. She was an American citizen of Japanese descent, and a young, independent, patriotic woman. In the summer of 1941, her parents convinced her to go to Japan to help care for a sick aunt. Iva was not happy about this situation. When she arrived, and was treated more like a servant than family, she was even less happy. Finally, in early December, Iva's father sends her a ticket to come back to America. Iva is elated, but she isn't able to get all of her paperwork together to make the next boat. Before she can leave, it is December 7, 1941, and the Japanese attack Pearl Harbor. Suddenly, Iva can't get home.

Because she is Nisei--of Japanese descent, but a foreigner--Iva is looked at with suspicion. She moves into an apartment of her own and works at a media place that does propaganda for the Japanese military. Eventually, she is recruited by a POW Australian major who is being forced by the Japanese to create radio programs to demoralize the western forces. She does the talking for his radio program until he has a medical emergency and the program is shut down.

When the war is over, Iva is ready to return home. She is offered $2,000 from a reporter to talk about her experiences as "Tokyo Rose"--a name for the many women who talked on the radio during the war. Not only did Iva not get paid for the interview, but she got caught in a political maelstrom and was charged with treason. Even though Iva is nothing but patriotic, the trial is a ridiculous show, and she is convicted and sentenced to ten years in prison (serving six). Her husband (a man she met when she was living in Japan) is never allowed back in the country and the two eventually divorce. Even after all this, Iva seemed to remain positive.

I found this to be an interesting look into something I had known nothing about. I'd never heard of Tokyo Rose, and I knew nothing about the injustice Iva suffered. The most powerful part of the book was when Iva was writing a letter home to her family in America, patriotically extolling the virtues of the United States while her family is being loaded into buses and taken to concentration camps.

I did have a couple of problems with this book, however. First, when I read the timeline at the end of the book, it stated that Iva had lost a child at some point after she got home and before she was tried with any crimes. However, the book made it seem like she lost the child in Japan, from the stress of being arrested. In addition, there were parts of the trial that were unrealistic and seemed to be done for dramatic purposes. It made me wonder about the veracity of the rest of the story.

Second, even after everything Iva goes through, she is nothing but patriotic until the end. This may be true, but I felt like she must have had some moments of doubt or anger at the government or people putting her through this. Or what did she feel when she learned her family was put in concentration camps and had lost everything? How could she not be bitter, even if she eventually got over it?

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