false 303669 1898104 0972898492 9780972898492 9 http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1190003262m/1898104.jpg http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1190003262s/1898104.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1898104.Losing_Kei 3.59 29
Jill Parker is an American painter living in Japan. Far from the trendy <cite>gaijin</cite> neighborhoods of downtown Tokyo, she's settled in a remote seaside village where she makes ends meet as a bar hostess. Her world appears to open when she meets Yusuke, a savvy and sensitive art gallery owner who believes in her talent. But their love affair, and subsequent marriage, is doomed to a life of domestic hell, for Yusuke is the <cite>chonan</cite>, the eldest son, who assumes the role of rigid patriarch in his traditional family while Jill's duty is that of a servile Japanese wife. A daily battle of wills ensues as Jill resists instruction in the proper womanly arts. Even the long-anticipated birth of a son, Kei, fails to unite them. Divorce is the only way out, but in Japan a foreigner has no rights to custody, and Jill must choose between freedom and abandoning her child.

Told with tenderness, humor, and an insider's knowledge of contemporary Japan, <cite>Losing Kei</cite> is the debut novel of an exceptional expatriate voice.

Suzanne Kamata's work has appeared in over one hundred publications. She is the editor of <cire>The Broken Bridge: Fiction from Expatriates in Literary Japan</cite> and a forthcoming anthology from Beacon Press on parenting children with disabilities. A five-time nominee for the Pushcart Prize, she has twice won the Nippon Airways/Wingspan Fiction Contest.]]> 303669 3.86 56 21 2008 2444461 0807000302 9780807000304 9 http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1256089407m/2444461.jpg http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1256089407s/2444461.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2444461.Love_You_to_Pieces_Creative_Writers_on_Raising_a_Child_with_SpecialNeeds 3.94 17
Responding to a dearth of literary writing on disability, Suzanne Kamata gathers parents' perspectives at various stages in the lives of children with mental or physical difficulties. In these real and fictional stories, families cope with autism, deafness, retardation, muscular dystrophy, and more, laying bare the moments of rage, disappointment, and guilt that can color their relationships. Parent/child communication is a challenge at the best of times, but here we see the epic struggles and triumphs of those who speak their own language—or don't speak at all—and those who love them.

Together, the authors—including Michael Bérubé, Jayne Anne Phillips, Penny Wolfson, Carol Zapata-Whelan, Marie Myung-Ok Lee, and Bret Lott—paint a beautiful, wrenchingly honest portrait of what it means to care for a child who does not experience the world as we do. The book serves as a site of quiet contemplation amid the swirling issues of medical research and disability rights, and the writers come clean about the complications of even the deepest love.

"Powerful, unflinching, and beautifully rendered, Love You to Pieces is not just an anthology about raising children with special needs, but true literature. Many parents will find moving depictions of a reality they know so well. Others with no knowledge of this world will find a literary experience they'll never forget."
—Rachel Simon, author of Riding the Bus with My Sister

"Love You To Pieces is a unique reading experience: raw, moving, provocative and compelling. The stories are beautifully told, from many different backgrounds and perspectives, but taken together share a common and ultimately triumphant connecting thread: love conquers all."
—Daniel Tammet, author of Born On A Blue Day: Inside the Extraordinary Mind of an Autistic Savant]]> 303669 3.86 56 21 2008 6098897 1932279334 9781932279337 3 http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1256057763m/6098897.jpg http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1256057763s/6098897.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/6098897.Call_Me_Okaasan_Adventures_in_Multicultural_Mothering 4.80 5 303669 3.86 56 21 2009 552957 1880656310 9781880656310 0 http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1175736776m/552957.jpg http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1175736776s/552957.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/552957.The_Broken_Bridge_Fiction_from_Expatriates_in_Literary_Japan 4.20 5 The Broken Bridge showcases the literary work of 36 non-Japanese writers, expatriates in Japan who provide 36 windows looking in on the country, revealing a Japan as seen through the eyes of writers who love and live, but who will never completely belong, in Japan. Gaijin (foreigners) to the Japanese, destined always to be outsiders to a certain extent, they all find their own balance between individual identity and conforming to Japanese society. The writers represent a variety of eras (from the occupation on through to the '90s) and they deal with love, dignity, adultery, desecration, and despair in stories that are alternately full of humor and humiliation, happiness and pain. An English teacher in Frank Tuohy's "The Broken Bridge" seeks the author of a troubled essay and discovers, after a series of cultural "mistakes," that the student has killed himself. Drawn with fascination to Miss Yukiya's body and Miss Hama's mind, Morgan Gibson's protagonist in "Is There a God in Your Heart?" looks up for the Big Dipper and falls into a ditch. While the literary styles are diverse, the quality never wavers as these writers explore their adopted country, their inner demons, and their love-hate relationships with Japan.]]> 303669 3.86 56 21 1997