The Buddha in the Attic

by

144 pages

English language

Published March 20, 2012 by Vintage.

ISBN:
978-0-307-70000-1
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4 stars (1 review)

In eight unforgettable sections, The Buddha in the Attic traces the extraordinary lives of these women, from their arduous journeys by boat, to their arrival in San Francisco and their tremulous first nights as new wives; from their experiences raising children who would later reject their culture and language, to the deracinating arrival of war.

Julie Otsuka has written a spellbinding novel about identity and loyalty, and what it means to be an American in uncertain times.

1 edition

reviewed The Buddha in the Attic by Julie Otsuka

A Collective We

4 stars

I listened to this as an audiobook, though not one I'd suggest listening to aloud in public. The book follows the journey of Japanese women from being shipped to the US, sold off to husbands who were not who they were told they were, up to a few decades later at the establishment of the first internment camps (around the 1940s). The writing never pulls any punches in telling the grim truth. The pluralistic narrative is a chorus that echos a collective memory of both things that were shared or specific to one person or another. The blurring of these narratives also tunes into how these individual voices have been historically erased, ending up in vague memories that make it harder to distinguish who is who among the "We" or "They", especially emphasized with the final parts of the book.

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