... poignant ... The memoir becomes a testament to the importance of their lives as Asian women, as mother and daughter, and an apology for all the years Brina thought otherwise ... strongest when Brina is recounting, with piercing candidness and clarity, the almost claustrophobic world of an only child and her parents — their shifting allegiances, the wounds they inflict on each other and their rocky path toward acceptance, apology and forgiveness. The memoir is also a portrait of the devastating effects of imperialism and racism on a person’s identity, self-worth and relationships—and offers a perspective on how a person can combat these legacies.
[A] masterful memoir in which Brina examines the complex relationship she has with her interracial parents ... Speak, Okinawa is both a mediation on Brina’s own family as well as a powerful history of the United States occupation of Okinawa, where it maintains a massive military presence to this day ... Brina’s writing is crisp, captivating and profound ... As educational as it is entertaining, Speak, Okinawa is well worth the read.
This is how a woman in her 40s comes to terms with her identity in a supposedly racially aware America. It’s a story written with pathos, humour, grace and a massive dose of cringe ... The real skill here lies in the empathy the author has for her parents and for her younger self ... This is ultimately a study in the intricate survival mechanisms we use to cope with what’s going on around us ... The family story is interwoven with the mind-bendingly unfortunate history of Okinawa, which is recounted here in fascinating, vivid historical asides ... Her writing is so warm and honest that you find yourself rooting for her and her parents, thrilled at her 'adult learner' conversations with her mother in stilted Japanese, willing them all to find a way to understand one another. This is quite simply a brilliantly original and affecting memoir.
... reads like a deeply personal apology from Brina to her mother ... For readers who are unfamiliar with Chinese-Japanese-Okinawan-American relations, the history of Okinawa, told in the first-person plural, is jarring in the most eye-opening way. The story is strongest when Brina connects the dots between the U.S. military’s colonization of Okinawa and her father’s family’s disrespect toward her mom ... Assimilation is often touted as a goal for immigrants in the U.S., but Brina shows how difficult it is for someone to assimilate when they’re already branded as an outcast—especially within their own family.
Speak, Okinawa is masterful at describing the internal dissonance that mixed race children can feel ... Brina details the often painful isolation mixed race children feel when trying to find belonging within their inherited ethnicities. She describes this inner conflict with biting clarity ... In one beautifully rendered chapter, Brina lays out, almost in list form, all of the crimes committed against the Okinawans at the hand of the United States military ... This list creates a cumulative effect that works to solidify the importance of freeing Okinawa from the hands of the United States military ... At the core of Speak, Okinawa, there is forgiveness ... She bears witness to her family’s complicated histories, and in doing so, she bears witness to herself, a mixed race woman born out of the generational trauma of two distinct, beautiful, tragic worlds.
Brina uses simple, direct language, often in the subject-verb-object format, to her advantage in order to paint blunt pictures, which reminds readers of her mother ... Each setting Brina paints is honest and, at times, brutal, whether it be a depiction of the Battle of Okinawa or an analysis of her parents’ marriage ... Brina’s awareness of her faults is as refreshing as it is hard to read. It can feel like we are reading about our own mistakes, but she does this to show that it is not too late to turn back and correct our wrongs. Speak, Okinawa is a beautiful request, from the prodigal daughter of an oppressed land, to take the time to listen to one another.
Brina’s uniquely structured memoir, which investigates her own past as the daughter of an Okinawan mother and a white American father, and the history of the Japanese prefecture of Okinawa ... These episodes inform the rest of Brina’s forthright and tunneling inquiry into how she came to understand the many inherited layers of herself and her racial identity. Deeply human portraits of her parents emerge alongside her own candid snapshots: stories of both disappointments and unconfined, unconditional love. Artfully concerned with the DNA-altering effects of trauma and the almost unfathomable power of language, Brina’s work opens a window on a lifelong search for peace, and the life-giving work of listening.
Brina captivates in her stunning and intimate debut memoir ... On a trip to Okinawa with her parents after her own broken engagement, she had an epiphany, realizing that her parents’ love is genuine but fraught with an unsettling power dynamic, evidenced by the fact that, on the trip, her father played tour guide, showing his naive 'country gal' the rest of her own nation. This nuanced tale goes both wide and deep, and is as moving as it is ambitious. Memoir lovers will be enthralled.
In a debut memoir, the daughter of an Okinawan Vietnam War bride and an American soldier grapples with her complex familial roots ... The author shows a similar tendency to overelaborate in this heartfelt but meandering account of her effort to understand what it means to be an Okinawan American whose mother was born on an island most Westerners only know as the site of a World War II battle ... Her account of her transformation is lyrical and well observed, and the author is to be commended for her dedication to excavating family history. However, despite the poetic flourishes, the text is too overburdened with literary contrivances, including first-person plural narration (used too frequently, it becomes disorienting), abrupt changes from present to past tense, and nonlinear chronology ... A multilayered exploration of Asian American identity hampered by too much literary artifice.
