#OWNVOICES REVIEW
ARC provided by the publisher for review
When a modern fairy tale stars a Japanese American girl and it feels like it was written just for you. Tokyo Ever After by Emiko Jean is an absolute delight. I loved it.
Izumi (Izzy) Tanaka is just about to graduate high school when she finds out her dad is the Crown Prince of Japan…making her a princess. She already feels like she doesn’t quite fit into her very white small town in Northern California, but will she fit in any better in Japan? Like so many of us, she’s too Japanese for America, and too American for Japan.
I loved that Emiko Jean took us to Japan, instead of yet another faux-European country. I loved Izzy’s brashness, her girl gang with the other three Asians at her high school, and that despite being a Harvard legacy, she’s headed for a state school. (I see you, girl). I loved that there’s a little bit of romance (her bodyguard!) wrapped into a story fundamentally tackling identity, belonging, and assimilation.
If you take Tokyo Ever After simply at face value, you’ll get a fun, “commoner is actually a princess” story with Asian representation. But really, Tokyo Ever After is a love letter to all of us who never saw ourselves in kidlit or YA princesses. Does that make Emiko Jean our fairy godmother? I gotta say yes.
If like me, you’re a Japanese American reader, (particularly yonsei or gosei), I think you’ll identify with Izzy and feel seen in ways JA’s still don’t get enough of in YA lit. It’s in the details and all the many moments that had me just, “Wow, this book is for us.”
Tokyo Ever After digs in to the Japanese American experience. It’s not just surface-level, take your shoes off at the door type stuff. It’s in the dynamic between Izzy and her mom (Sansei/Yonsei relationships are different than the generations before), the micro (and not-so micro) aggressions from white classmates, the sense of being of a culture, but not from it.
It’s almost hard to put into words how Tokyo Ever After made me feel. Elated. Joyful. Validated. Just plain seen. All from a story about a secret princess.
Tokyo Ever After by Emiko Jean hits shelves on Tuesday, May 18. Signed copies are available for pre-order from Annie Bloom’s Books.
Or get it from Bookshop.org | IndieBound | Amazon | Apple Books
Emiko Jean will also be promoting the book in a series of virtual author talks starting May 18.
Tuesday, May 18 — Blue Willow Bookshop (via Zoom)
Monday, May 24 – Books & Books
Thursday, June 3 – Litquake & Eastwind Books
