Diary of a Tokyo Teen

Author: Christine Mari Inzer
Publisher: Tuttle Publishing
ISBN: 146291876X
Category : Young Adult Nonfiction
Languages : en
Pages : 161

Book Description
A book for comic lovers and Japanophiles of all ages, Diary of a Tokyo Teen presents a unique look at modern-day Japan through a young woman's eyes. Born in Tokyo to a Japanese mother and an American father in 1997, Christine Mari Inzer spent her early years in Japan and relocated to the United States in 2003. The summer before she turned sixteen, she returned to Tokyo, making a solo journey to get reacquainted with her birthplace. Through illustrations, photos, and musings, Inzer documented her journey. In Diary of a Tokyo Teen, Inzer explores the cutting-edge fashions of Tokyo's trendy Harajuku district, eats the best sushi of her life at the renowned Tsukiji fish market, and hunts down geisha in the ancient city of Kyoto. As she shares the trials and pleasures of travel from one end of a trip to the other, Inzer introduces the host of interesting characters she meets and offers a unique--and often hilarious--look at a fascinating country and an engaging tale of one girl rediscovering her roots. **Listed as a 2016 Great Graphic Novel for Teens by the Young Adult Library Services Association**

My Awesome Japan Adventure

Author: Rebecca Otowa
Publisher: Tuttle Publishing
ISBN: 1462913466
Category : Juvenile Nonfiction
Languages : en
Pages : 48

Book Description
PICKED AS ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF 2013 BY THE ASSOCIATION OF BOOKSELLERS FOR CHILDREN! A perfect introduction to Japanese culture for kids, My Awesome Japan Adventure is the diary of an American fifth grader who travels to Japan to spend four exciting months with a Japanese family as an exchange student. He records all his adventures in this diary so that he can tell his friends back home about what he did and saw during his time in Japan. With the help of a Japanese foster brother and sister he visits a Ninja village, tries new foods, learns brush painting, and gets the inside scoop on daily life in a Japanese school. Readers of all ages will love experiencing life in Japan from a kid's point of view! Dan's adventures include: My First Week of School, Visiting a Ninja Village, Fun with Origami, Practicing Aikido, Making Mochi, and much more… As a multicultural children's book, My Awesome Japan Adventure is perfect for kids who want to explore another culture and have fun in the process!

Japanese Schoolgirl Inferno

Author: Izumi Evers
Publisher: Chronicle Books
ISBN: 0811878856
Category : Crafts & Hobbies
Languages : en
Pages : 153

Book Description
Japanese schoolgirl fashions and subcultures have sprung up, burned out, mutated, and evolved into a pop culture phenomenon gone global—from Gwen Stefani's "Harajuku Girls" to Gothic Lolita-fueled manga and the deadly schoolgirl in Kill Bill, it's no wonder that international fashion designers look to the streets of Tokyo for fresh inspiration. This playful and thoroughly researched handbook examines the key styles and subcultures past and present: sailor-suited gangsters, Pippi Longstockings risen from the dead, girls in blackface, teens sporting giant hamster costumes, and more. Each fashion profile is packed with photos and illustrations, history, ideal boyfriends, and must-have items. Also included are a gatefold evolutionary fashion chart, resources, and makeup tips. At last, an in-depth guide to what the girls are wearing—and why on earth they're wearing it.

A Tale for the Time Being

Author: Ruth Ozeki
Publisher: Penguin
ISBN: 1101606258
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 621

Book Description
A brilliant, unforgettable novel from bestselling author Ruth Ozeki, author of The Book of Form and Emptiness Finalist for the Booker Prize and the National Book Critics Circle Award “A time being is someone who lives in time, and that means you, and me, and every one of us who is, or was, or ever will be.” In Tokyo, sixteen-year-old Nao has decided there’s only one escape from her aching loneliness and her classmates’ bullying. But before she ends it all, Nao first plans to document the life of her great grandmother, a Buddhist nun who’s lived more than a century. A diary is Nao’s only solace—and will touch lives in ways she can scarcely imagine. Across the Pacific, we meet Ruth, a novelist living on a remote island who discovers a collection of artifacts washed ashore in a Hello Kitty lunchbox—possibly debris from the devastating 2011 tsunami. As the mystery of its contents unfolds, Ruth is pulled into the past, into Nao’s drama and her unknown fate, and forward into her own future. Full of Ozeki’s signature humor and deeply engaged with the relationship between writer and reader, past and present, fact and fiction, quantum physics, history, and myth, A Tale for the Time Being is a brilliantly inventive, beguiling story of our shared humanity and the search for home.

Onibi: Diary of a Yokai Ghost Hunter

Author: Cecile Brun
Publisher: Tuttle Publishing
ISBN: 1462920284
Category : Young Adult Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 132

Book Description
*Winner Japan International Manga Award* *Honorable Mention for 2018 Freeman Book Awards for Children's and Young Adult's Literature on East and Southeast Asia* *Short-listed for the 2019 Dwayne McDuffie Award for Kids' Comics* Part fantasy, part travelogue--this graphic novel transports readers to the intersection of the natural and supernatural worlds. Onibi: Diary of a Yokai Ghost Hunter follows the adventures of two young foreigners as they travel to a remote and mysterious corner of Japan. Along the way, they purchase an old camera that has the unique ability to capture images of Japan's invisible spirit world. Armed with their magical camera, they explore the countryside and meet people who tell them about the forgotten ghosts, ghouls and demons who lie in wait ready to play tricks on them. These Yokai, or supernatural beings, are sometimes kind, sometimes mischievous, and sometimes downright dangerous! Readers young and old will enjoy following along on this journey of mystery and discovery. The comic book format will appeal to anime and manga fans, while introducing the ancient spirit world that is such an important part of Japanese culture. With the help of Atelier Sento's gorgeous watercolor and colored pencil artwork, you can't help but feel immersed in this fantasy.

Himawari House

Author: Harmony Becker
Publisher: First Second
ISBN: 1250861063
Category : Young Adult Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 384

Book Description
A young adult graphic novel about three foreign exchange students and the pleasures, and difficulties, of adjusting to living in Japan. Living in a new country is no walk in the park—Nao, Hyejung, and Tina can all attest to that. The three of them became fast friends through living together in the Himawari House in Tokyo and attending the same Japanese cram school. Nao came to Japan to reconnect with her Japanese heritage, while Hyejung and Tina came to find freedom and their own paths. Though each of them has her own motivations and challenges, they all deal with language barriers, being a fish out of water, self discovery, love, and family.

Tokyo on Foot

Author: Florent Chavouet
Publisher: Tuttle Publishing
ISBN: 1462906400
Category : Travel
Languages : en
Pages : 216

Book Description
This prize-winning book is both an illustrated tour of a Tokyo rarely seen in Japan travel guides and an artist's warm, funny, visually rich, and always entertaining graphic memoir. Florent Chavouet, a young graphic artist, spent six months exploring Tokyo while his girlfriend interned at a company there. Each day he would set forth with a pouch full of color pencils and a sketchpad, and visit different neighborhoods. This stunning book records the city that he got to know during his adventures. It isn't the Tokyo of packaged tours and glossy guidebooks, but a grittier, vibrant place, full of ordinary people going about their daily lives and the scenes and activities that unfold on the streets of a bustling metropolis. Here you find businessmen and women, hipsters, students, grandmothers, shopkeepers, policemen, and other urban types and tribes in all manner of dress and hairstyles. A temple nestles among skyscrapers; the corner grocery anchors a diverse assortment of dwellings, cafes, and shops--often tangled in electric lines. The artist mixes styles and tags his pictures with wry comments and observations. Realistically rendered advertisements or posters of pop stars contrast with cartoon sketches of iconic objects or droll vignettes, like a housewife walking her pet pig, a Godzilla statue in a local park, and an urban fishing pond that charges 400 yen per half hour. This very personal guide to Tokyo is organized by neighborhood with hand-drawn maps that provide an overview of each neighborhood, but what really defines them is what caught the artist's eye and attracted his formidable drawing talent. Florent Chavouet begins his introduction by observing that, "Tokyo is said to be the most beautiful of ugly cities." With wit, a playful sense of humor, and the multicolor pencils of his kit, he sets aside the question of urban ugliness or beauty and captures the Japanese essence of a great city in this truly vital portrait.

Tokyo Love Story

Author: Julie Blanchin Fujita
Publisher: Tuttle Publishing
ISBN: 1462922155
Category : Travel
Languages : en
Pages : 212

Book Description
A funny and intimate travelogue of one woman's unexpected adventures in Japan. French illustrator Julie Blanchin-Fujita arrived in Tokyo for what she thought would be a one-year stint, and ended up never leaving. In this graphic novel-style memoir she shares her love of Japan, while depicting personal experiences and stories from her life in Tokyo--from the exotic (sumo wrestlers, ramen, hot springs, tatami mats, bentos, Japanese trains, Mount Fuji, earthquakes) to the everyday (hanging out with friends, moving houses, falling in love). Her voyage of discovery in the world's most exciting city will appeal to a broad range of readers--from those contemplating a trip to Tokyo and Japanophiles to fans of graphic novels and anyone who enjoys a good manga love story. Packed with keen cultural observations, this enchanting story is told in both English and Japanese--also making it a great language learning resource.

Strange Weather in Tokyo

Author: Hiromi Kawakami
Publisher: Catapult
ISBN: 1640090177
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 205

Book Description
Shortlisted for the 2013 Man Asian Literary Prize, Strange Weather in Tokyo is a story of loneliness and love that defies age. Tsukiko, thirty–eight, works in an office and lives alone. One night, she happens to meet one of her former high school teachers, "Sensei," in a local bar. Tsukiko had only ever called him "Sensei" ("Teacher"). He is thirty years her senior, retired, and presumably a widower. Their relationship develops from a perfunctory acknowledgment of each other as they eat and drink alone at the bar, to a hesitant intimacy which tilts awkwardly and poignantly into love. As Tsukiko and Sensei grow to know and love one another, time's passing is marked by Kawakami's gentle hints at the changing seasons: from warm sake to chilled beer, from the buds on the trees to the blooming of the cherry blossoms. Strange Weather in Tokyo is a moving, funny, and immersive tale of modern Japan and old–fashioned romance.

Halfway Home

Author: Christine Mari Inzer
Publisher:
ISBN: 9780990701408
Category : Comics & Graphic Novels
Languages : en
Pages : 102

Book Description
The summer before she turned sixteen, Christine Inzer traveled solo to Tokyo to get reacquainted with her birthplace. Through charming illustrations, photos, and musings, Christine takes us on a journey through modern Japan: she explores the fashion hub of Harajuku; she hunts down geisha in Kyoto; she eats the best sushi of her life in Tsukiji; and she meets many interesting characters along the way. Halfway Home is an engaging-and often hilarious-look at a fascinating country and a girl rediscovering her roots.