Rating: 
Summary: Mis-History Again
Review: It's fascinating the cyclical nature of the universe from the shape of a whirlpool to shape of a hurricane to the shape of the galaxies themselves---all things spiral. So it is with history if only because we are cyclical, habitual, repetitive beings ourselves. This novel details the identity crisis of a young man, not a boy, whose world is torn apart when white racism rears its ugly head. Historically, the novel details the enslavement of Americans of Japanese ancestry in the 20th century. Only men could escape by signing up to die in the war for capitalism. All others, except the Americans of Japanese ancestry on Hawaii who were forced to labor on Dole plantations, were imprisoned. Ichiro's dilemma is that America clearly does not want what he has to contribute as human being. The anti-Japanese/Asian propaganda during WWII began before Pearl Harbor and was just a hate-filled as the campaigns in Nazi Germany, Apartheid South Africa, or the long history of America against Blacks and Native Americans. Ichiro is supported by his mother, a pragmatist who recognizes that American racism will never accept them and so retreats to support for Japan. Yet, always tugging is the desire to acclimate and integrate into the burning house of American democracy. Ichiro is constantly judged by those who have every sort of idea on how best he should live his life. Yet no one is willing to accept him as a human being who can define his life on his own terms. This story is a classic, bildungsroman (coming of age tale), detailing from an insider's point of view, the alienation and isolation of anyone in America who is NOT a white anglo-saxon protestant heterosexual wealthy male. This is the story of the struggle to be an American.
Rating: 
Summary: Deft, unsentimental treatment of a difficult subject
Review: John Okada explores race and identity in postwar North America with an unflinching, sensitive eye. His protagonist is a Japanese-American who has spent the duration of the war in prison for refusing military service, on the advice of his mother, who believed the Japanese emperor would call them all home some day. He struggles with the consequences of that decision for the remainder of the novel. This isn't simply a Japanese-American internment story, but a rich analysis of what it means to be non-white in the United States, and all the pain and joy that accompanies such an identity.Beyond the compelling subject matter, his prose is poetic, visceral, gently engaging of all the senses. The dialogue is evocative without being bogged down by elaborate dialect. Okada has a talent for a natural, flowing narrative voice that almost dreamily leads the reader through complex emotional issues. I cannot understand reviewers who criticized this book as "preachy" - in fact, Okada seems to go out of his way to avoid expressing personal opinions on how the reader should feel about the events described. Never did I feel he was driving home a moral lesson or other. The framework of the discovery of the novel - as explained in the forward by Frank Chin - is another tragic and dramatic story in itself. Chin's white-hot rage at the loss of Okada's research and papers fairly bristles off the page. The forward is a passionate essay about the birth of Asian-American literature and is worth a read on its own.
Rating:
Summary: Asian American literature at its best
Review: John Okada's novel is one of the pioneering works of a growing field of American literature that shares the unique experiences of a group mostly neglected by mainstream America: Asian Americans. This category of literature, known as Asian American literature, seeks to expose the difficulty of finding identity that these Americans have faced because they don't fit in either the mainstream Caucasian American identity or the "model minority" (i.e. African American) identity that has been so prevalent in America, both past and present.
This story takes place during World War II: a terrible time for Japanese Americans, the subjects of this story. It shares the difficulty that a young Japanese American man named Ichiro faced when choosing not to fight for America, the country he always called his home. The two years in prison he spent for rejecting the draft was not nearly as painful as the difficulty of defining himself as an American. America is the country that, on one hand, is his home by birth and residence and, on the other hand, has punished his ethnic group via internment based solely on a distant place of origin. On his journey to find his identity he comes upon many characters, both Japanese Americans and others, that come to shape his perception of what it means to be an American. "No-No Boy" is a magnificent piece of Asian American literature.
Rating:
Summary: Asian American literature at its best
Review: John Okada's novel is one of the pioneering works of a growing field of American literature that shares the unique experiences of a group mostly neglected by mainstream America: Asian Americans. This category of literature, known as Asian American literature, seeks to expose the difficulty of finding identity that these Americans have faced because they don't fit in either the mainstream Caucasian American identity or the "model minority" (i.e. African American) identity that has been so prevalent in America, both past and present.
This story takes place during World War II: a terrible time for Japanese Americans, the subjects of this story. It shares the difficulty that a young Japanese American man named Ichiro faced when choosing not to fight for America, the country he always called his home. The two years in prison he spent for rejecting the draft was not nearly as painful as the difficulty of defining himself as an American. America is the country that, on one hand, is his home by birth and residence and, on the other hand, has punished his ethnic group via internment based solely on a distant place of origin. On his journey to find his identity he comes upon many characters, both Japanese Americans and others, that come to shape his perception of what it means to be an American. "No-No Boy" is a magnificent piece of Asian American literature.
Rating: 
Summary: Exercise of Ineptitude
Review: No-No Boy by John Okada is one of those true rarities in published work: a poorly-written book which contains neither substance nor style. Tragedy in literature is difficult to portray. Readers need to be challenged in order to connect with the protagonist or little empathy can be established. But by sketching a crude portrait of a one-dimensional lead character, Okada does nothing to attempt to make even the most sensitive reader give a scrap of concern over his trite story. I realize that the protagonist is a victim of a series of awful coincidences, but after all is said and done, every person alive or dead is subjected to random coincidence and misfortune. The secret is not to whine or dote but rather attempt to learn how to improve one's own standing, and accept the inevitability of chance and strive for upward mobility in spite of awful circumstance. None of which the lead character even attempts. By the end of this trivial, poorly-written ... job, readers seldom care. Definitely the WORST book I have ever read.
Rating: 
Summary: Ground Breaking
Review: No-No Boy examines the struggle of identity for a Japanese American after World War II. One of the first Asian American novels to address issues of Asian American identity, loyalty and home, No-No Boy is a ground breaking novel.
Rating:
Summary: Can you have an identity crisis without having an identity?
Review: Okada follows the story of Ichiro, a young Japanese-American who has just been released from prison for refusing to be drafted. Ichiro meets many people along the way, people who color Ichiro's view of the world and of himself (the dying Kenji is probably the most memorable). Ultimately, Ichiro realizes that the world will be what he makes of it: either he decides to live and love life, or he can become bitter and be destroyed (like his pal Freddie). Throughout the entire story, Ichiro struggles with his identity as an individual. Japan and the Japanese are as foreign to him as any other race, but ethnically he is Japanese. He is as American as anyone else in the country, but he is cursed to be called a "Jap" simply because of his features. Ichiro tries to deal with his guilt and the reality of a bigoted world while searching for some niche where he can live a good life. During this process, Ichiro meets people of all races and backgrounds who ultimately convince him not to give up. He has made a mistake, yes, but so did the government. It will not be easy, but if he chooses to live, to keep dancing while the music is playing, he just might make it. This was my first experience with Asian-American literature, and it was enlightening to read about all the confusion and all of the pent up rage contained within Ichiro. The Japanese-Americans, perhaps more so than any other minority group in America, keep a low profile even now, so it was interesting to read Okada's story. No-No Boy is a good story and provides a good look at the issues surrounding Japanese-Americans.
Rating:
Summary: Can you have an identity crisis without having an identity?
Review: Okada follows the story of Ichiro, a young Japanese-American who has just been released from prison for refusing to be drafted. Ichiro meets many people along the way, people who color Ichiro's view of the world and of himself (the dying Kenji is probably the most memorable). Ultimately, Ichiro realizes that the world will be what he makes of it: either he decides to live and love life, or he can become bitter and be destroyed (like his pal Freddie). Throughout the entire story, Ichiro struggles with his identity as an individual. Japan and the Japanese are as foreign to him as any other race, but ethnically he is Japanese. He is as American as anyone else in the country, but he is cursed to be called a "Jap" simply because of his features. Ichiro tries to deal with his guilt and the reality of a bigoted world while searching for some niche where he can live a good life. During this process, Ichiro meets people of all races and backgrounds who ultimately convince him not to give up. He has made a mistake, yes, but so did the government. It will not be easy, but if he chooses to live, to keep dancing while the music is playing, he just might make it. This was my first experience with Asian-American literature, and it was enlightening to read about all the confusion and all of the pent up rage contained within Ichiro. The Japanese-Americans, perhaps more so than any other minority group in America, keep a low profile even now, so it was interesting to read Okada's story. No-No Boy is a good story and provides a good look at the issues surrounding Japanese-Americans.
Rating:
Summary: A unique, thoughtful perspective on American identity
Review: One of the early books in the growing field of Asian-American literature, No-No Boy is the story of a young Japanese American's struggle to define himself at a time when Japanese American men were forced to prove their loyalty by enlisting in the Army and, even if they did so, accept internment of their families because they could not be trusted. The man, Ichiro, does not enlist and is therefore imprisoned for two years and his family interned. The story begins with Ichiro's release from prison and immediately places you into the mind of a young man who is truly lost. Though he feels he betrayed himself (as an American) by choosing not to enlist, while most of his comrades chose to do so, he explores over time what it really takes to be an American, and if is even possible for him, a Japanese, to gain this identity. By proving his loyalty to his country via the Army, would that have really been enough for him to be accepted as American first and Japanese second on the American street and in the American community? Ichiro is not alone to explore this and many other thoughtful questions. The book covers sensitive subjects and is emotionally charged, so be prepared for a truly unique and unforgettable experience.
Rating:
Summary: The most neglected work in American letters.
Review: Sadly, this excellent portrait of one man's experience with the effects of racism and post-war hysteria is largely unknown by the reading populace. Unfortunately, books like "Snow Falling on Cedars" and movies like "Come See the Paradise", which use the lives of Japanese Americans during wartime only as scenery, have much more prominence in the mainstream. And in this book, written over 40 years ago when, as Lawson Fusao Inada writes in his introduction, a "Jap was a just a Jap", one might discover the reason why this shameful mark in the less-than-pristine history of the United States has not been faced for what it was. Okada's soliloquy, mouthed through his main character Ichiro, along with friends Emi, Kenji, Freddie, and his mother and father, testifies to the complexity of race relations and racism in this country, and to the suffering it imparts to its victims. The suffering, alienation, and utter loneliness that Ichiro goes through is almost unbearable to read. But even harder to swallow is that Ichiro is a victim of history and place, and that smallness that is inflicted upon him will be very difficult for many readers to face. But Okada's work is more than just a social treatise on the state of racism in America, it is a testament to human suffering and the cruelty and ugliness of life and those who live it. It is also a very optimistic book, for in the end, we are left with the main character - who has suffered complete alienation from the two nations that made his life possible, America and Japan - grasping for hope.
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