Faulkner, Matt. My Nest of Silence. Atheneum, 2022. 373p.
This unique historical novel is a hybrid of a prose novel and a graphic novel, making it engaging for many types of middle school readers. Mari describes life in the Manzanar camp with her parents, while her older brother Mak draws comic pages to describe his experience in the Army in Europe.
Many California students will have friends or relatives who are Japanese-American, but this is a book that almost anyone can relate to. It has a nice balance of humor that tempers the overall serious topic.
Discussion Questions
- Mari decides to stop talking until her brother Mak returns safely. Have you ever thought about just staying quiet when you have something bothering you?
- Mari draws to express herself. Does art or drawing help you process your feelings?
- Part of this book is done like a graphic novel. Do you like graphic novels? What can you say to people who think graphic novels are not “real” books?
- Mari and her parents struggle to understand each other. What advice would you give her on having a better relationship with her parents?
- In the U.S. today, could the government decide to put people in a camp just based on their race, without proving they committed a crime?
Related Activities
Have a simple drawing activity to represent how Mari communicates –How to draw a Bird Very Easy Step by Step – YouTube.
Have the group draw a comic page, similar to what Mak sends to Mari: Free printable comic strip templates you can customize | Canva.
Make an origami bird: Easy Origami Bird (freekidscrafts.com).
Show the photos from the book Seen and Unseen: What Dorothea Lange, Toyo Miyatake, and Ansel Adams Photograph’s Reveal about the Japanese American Incarceration by Elizabeth Partridge and Lauren Tamaki, Chronicle Books, 2022. This award-winning nonfiction book is filled with photos of the Manzanar camp.
Have a snack of rice crackers or other foods Mari liked that she had at Manzanar.
Penny Peck, San Jose State University iSchool
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