The propulsive engine of a mystery is, on its face, self-explanatory: a crime or inexplicable event occurs, and the rest of the narrative follows its central protagonist as she attempts to unravel falsehoods to arrive at the truth of what happened. Yet the genre of mystery and crime fiction is itself ever shifting, constantly reinventing itself. Consider Naomi Hirahara’s work, for instance: her 2021 novel, Clark and Division, the August California Book Club selection, takes the structure of a mystery and grafts it onto the terrain of historical fiction.
Clark and Division follows Aki Ito, a first-generation Japanese American girl whose life is abruptly upended after the bombing of Pearl Harbor and the announcement that the United States has declared war on Japan and entered World War II. Aki; her sister, Rose; and her parents have lived most of their lives in Tropico, an agricultural district of Los Angeles, and are forced to move to a Japanese concentration camp in Manzanar, California, where they are interned for many years. Rose is able to leave early. She relocates to Chicago, where her family plans to later join her. However, on the day Aki and her parents arrive in Chicago, they learn that Rose has died just the day before at the Clark and Division train stop and that her death has been ruled a suicide.
Aki, who cherished and idolized her sister, instinctively suspects foul play. In the midst of preparing for a funeral and acclimating to a new life in the Midwest, she investigates the events leading up to her sister’s death and tries to figure out who killed her.
Aki’s investigation follows a seemingly classic whodunnit narrative arc, and readers are keen to turn the page to discover what has happened to her beloved Rose. But more questions and mysteries pulse through the heart of Clark and Division: How will Aki and her family survive in Chicago, a place that’s not their home? Will Aki and her family ever recover from the wounds of living in an internment camp for several years and then the subsequent blow of losing a dear child and sibling? Who is the father of the fetus Rose ultimately aborted? What are the other stories of Japanese and Japanese American people who were forced to endure such hardships in the early 20th century? Who were their survivors, and how have they coped?
This novel is suffused with rich historical details that Hirahara researched herself. Long before Hirahara published novels, she published nonfiction monographs detailing the stories of Japanese and Japanese American people in Southern California and during World War II. The impact of this research is felt in her pages. Clark and Division is highly attuned to its geographic location and historical context precisely because it is a narrative of displacement.
As in her Mas Arai series, Hirahara uses the genre of mystery to simulate the process of unearthing ostensibly lost personal and national histories. Aki attempts to excavate her sister’s path at the same time that Clark and Division itself, as a project, is attempting to recuperate the history of a marginalized community and culture. Hirahara’s act of mining the past mirrors Aki’s actions in trying to solve the mystery about Rose. This perhaps explains why each chapter following Rose’s death includes excerpts of Rose’s diary entries, which have the texture of a personal and historical archive.
Clark and Division tries to apprehend the interiority, the feltness, the social fabric of a people who are no longer here to tell their own story. And Hirahara tells these stories deftly, with a compassionate and discerning eye.•
Join us on August 17 at 5 p.m., when Hirahara will appear in conversation with California Book Club host John Freeman and a special guest to discuss Clark and Division. Register for the Zoom conversation here.
EXCERPT
Read an excerpt from the opening pages of Hirahara’s Clark and Division. —Alta
WHY READ THIS
Alta Journal books editor David L. Ulin recommends Clark and Division, writing that “it is representative not only of its moment but also of the one in which we currently find ourselves.” —Alta
REFUSING TO FILIBUSTER REALITY
John Freeman writes about grief, music, and coming of age in Hua Hsu’s Stay True. —Alta
EVENT RECAP
If you missed the CBC event with Hua Hsu, author of Stay True, you can watch it or read a recap here. —Alta
SISTERLY BETRAYAL
Alta Journal assistant editor Jessica Blough reviews Ruth Madievsky’s All-Night Pharmacy. —Alta
MAPS
California author Cristina García’s latest novel, Vanishing Maps, is reviewed by novelist Gabriela Garcia, who calls it “a true aesthete’s novel.” —New York Times
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