No-No Boy tells the story of Ichiro Yamada, a fictional version of the real-life no-no boys. Yamada answered no twice in a compulsory government questionnaire as to whether he would serve in the armed forces and swear loyalty to the United States. Unwilling to pledge himself to the country that interned him and his family, Ichiro earns two years in prison and the hostility of his family and community when he returns home to Seattle. As Ozeki writes, Ichiros obsessive, tormented voice subverts Japanese postwar model-minority stereotypes, showing a fractured community and one mans threnody of guilt, rage, and blame as he tries to negotiate his reentry into a shattered world.
- | Author: John Okada
- | Publisher: University of Washington Press
- | Publication Date: August 01, 2014
- | Number of Pages: 232 pages
- | Language: English
- | Binding: Paperback
- | ISBN-10: 0295994045
- | ISBN-13: 9780295994048
