Tokuda-Hall, Maggie. Love in the Library. Yas Imamura, Illus. Picture Book. Penguin/Random, 02/2022. [32]pp. $18.99. 978-1-5362-0430-8. OUTSTANDING GRADES 1-4.
Maggie Tokuda-Hall’s beautiful, spare writing pairs perfectly with Yas Imamura’s gouache-and-watercolor illustrations to tell the story of how the author’s grandparents, Tama and George, met and fell in love while imprisoned at Minidoka, Idaho during WW II. The storytelling is gentle enough to make the Japanese incarceration period accessible to younger readers, yet rich enough, especially with the author’s note, to interest older readers and build on their knowledge. The story opens with Tama walking through heat and dust to go to work at the camp’s library, where she immerses herself in stories, and meets George, who visits the library daily. She eventually shares with him her feelings of despair, frustration, and uncertainty about the future, and he replies that there’s a word for that: “human.” We are reminded that even in circumstances designed to dehumanize, love and hope can bloom. The author’s note provides additional history and places this period not as an isolated, shameful event, but as part of a through line of acts of racial oppression throughout this country’s history. A welcome addition to every library’s picture book collection on the Ja
panese incarceration period, particularly since many popular titles on this topic are nearly a decade old or more.
Cindy Gullikson, Joaquin Miller School OUSD