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"Gaijen: American Prisoner of War"

Written and Illustrated by Matt Faulkner

       
Image Source: mattfaulkner.com
"Gaijen: American Prisoner of War" was inspired by Faulkner's great aunt who was in one of these prisoner camps with her own children during WWII. Koji is half Japanese and after Pearl Harbor is bombed he has to go to a prison camp. Koji is only 13 years old and his American mother goes to plead with the administration that he cannot go alone, so she has to go with him. Throughout the book the reader will see the horrible conditions that the Japanese Americans had to live in on these prisoner camps.
        Faulkner's use of unapologetic illustrations and harsh text shows the realities of the conditions Japanese Americans endured. He uses intense colors and lines to show emotions and movements throughout that help drive the stories fast pace. Older children will be able to understand the plot and may even learn about the use of internment camps. (I for one know that I had not learned about the Japanese American internment camps until I was an undergraduate student!) This is a stand alone graphic novel, however, a child could find other resources on Japanese prisoner camps, such as "Seen and unseen what Dorothea Lange, Toyo Miyatake and Ansel Adams' photographs reveal about the Japanese American Incarceration" by Elizabeth Partridge. 


Faulkner, Matt. Gaijen: American Prisoner of War. Illustrated by Matt Faulkner. Hyperion Books, 2014.  ISBN 978-142313735-1.
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