The Floating World

by Cynthia Kadohata

Twelve-year-old Olivia, her parents, grandmother, and three younger brothers search for better times as they travel by car though the United States, encountering racism, friendship, and the magic in ordinary life. (Nancy Pearl)

Genres: Fiction, Asian American, Novels, Japan, Young Adult

193 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1989

About the author

Cynthia Kadohata is a Japanese American writer known for her insightful coming-of-age stories about Asian American women. Her first published short story appeared in The New Yorker in 1986. As she spent her early childhood in the American South, the author set both her first adult novel and her first novel for children in Southern states. The former became a New York Times Notable Book of the Year, and the latter--her first children's book, entitled Kira-Kira--won the 2005 Newbery Medal.

Reviews

[Alan · Rating 4 out of 5]

1994 notebook: About a family of itinerant Japanese chicken- sexers along America's West Coast, told from the pov of the girl in the family. Coming of age story, some beautiful passages about moving from one place to another. Skin, sky, breath, colours of feeling (synaesthesia?) etc. Very good.

[Jim · Rating 3 out of 5]

Although the blurbs say the book is narrated through the eyes of a twelve-year old Japanese American girl, this really isn't so; it is narrated almost as a memoir by an older woman looking back on various incidents of her life from 12 til 21. In fact, at times, it was jarring that the voice seemed to try to be simplistic, yet at same time employed words or ideas a younger person wouldn't use. No matter, it is still an interesting story that gives insights into what life was like for the author (although fictionalized) as her family traveled about, eventually landing in Arkansas, and it covers many of the dynamics of a family that lived close together: a grouchy (though probably the most interesting character) old grandmother, a warm-hearted stepfather who liked to gamble, an unhappy mother, younger boy siblings, and numerous relatives, friends, coworkers, and boyfriends also make appearances. Although some classify it as YA, I am not so sure all parents will like some of the scenes (including sex), though high schoolers really wouldn't have that much trouble with the language and adult themes. It is more about fitting in than any real exploration of anti-Japanese discrimination or racism. And there are times I wondered why she told this story or mentioned this other thing. Still, it was pretty good, and I enjoyed it.

[Genevieve · Rating 3 out of 5]

Beautifully written, in an understatedly poetic way. Kadohata paints a portrait of a girl's growing-up in a Japanese-American family that moves from Oregon to Arkansas in "the fifties and sixties," and evokes characters, time, and place, with a few swift brushstrokes. One gets the sense of the world as a rich and mysterious place. The book reminded me a little of The Bean Trees by Barbara Kingsolver: there's something similar in the two novels' treatment of life.

I like that Kadohata's characters are Japanese-American but without that fact being the defining aspect of the story––it appears at times, but this isn't an immigrant story and it's not about culture clashes; the characters' ethnicity plays a much subtler role, in a way that feels true to me.

The one objection I have is that the structure of the book felt a little too episodic; one strand would be developed but rather than picking up again later on it would disappear and something new would come up. There's no real arc to the story, which may be more true to life, but is a little dissatisfying in a novel.

[Stephen · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of my favorite quotes from the novel:

“I worked part time at the hatchery but then got another job, keeping an elderly man company three times a week. I read to him, listened to the radio with him, cleaned for him. We used to spend hours together raking leaves quietly, even going beyond his property, just for the pleasure of raking. His property was full of trees, and leaves would be spread all over, varying in color from the reds and golds of autumn to pastel greens, the leaves seemingly encompassing all seasons at once. For a while he was feuding with all his relatives, and I was his best friend. I worked for him only a few months; he’s an elusive memory now, yet I was really fond of him. Sometimes, on hard days, I think about what a happy but small part of my life that was, and I start to feel waves of sadness arising from the loss of something so sweet and transient” (135).

[Becca · Rating 4 out of 5]

Almost nothing happens but it's really really interesting. How do authors do that? Kadohata's tone is weird and kind of funny, a little optimistic, a little bleak, lonely and loyal. This book reads with the simplicity of a diary or a memoir-- with weird memories whose surreality makes them believable. Swimming to a half-sunk boat and finding a pair of shoes, pictures proliferating on the family shrine, excruciating every day marital doubts and pains...

The road is that "floating world"-- the transience of travel, small towns, long bus rides, grimy apartments. The floating world is the montage of the small but intimate interactions you have with strangers on the road-- the neighbor playing opera records, the waitress with the clear nail polish.

This book never lands. It begins and ends with ghostliness. What a writer.

[Jessica · Rating 3 out of 5]

There were some lovely moments in the book, where the writing was poetic and the author touched on truth. But those moments were transient and overall I had a difficult time liking the characters and thought the moments spliced together in this coming of age story were random and not particularly interesting or insightful.

[Rachel · Rating 5 out of 5]

This episodic first novel takes place in the 1950s and '60s and is narrated by Olivia Osaka, who we follow from age 12 to 22, first as she travels with her family from Oregon to Arkansas and later as she strikes out on her own in Los Angeles. The floating world of the title refers to the circumstances that keep the family moving through motel towns and temporary jobs, but to Olivia it also refers to both the happiness and the loneliness of an unstable world. It's beautifully written and melancholy without being cynical. I keep seeing it described as a coming-of-age novel, but I think the story of Olivia and her family is closer to the way she described the migrant farmworkers as she watched them at the beginning and ending of each day: "... in transit. They were moving from the hard life just past to the life, maybe harder, to come."

[hotsake (André Troesch) · Rating 2 out of 5]

I found the writing to be pretty clunky, and it never flowed well. Also for a book of this kind you ready need to be able to connect with the main character but I found her to be thoroughly unlikable. This book is a rambling bunch of bullshit.
1.75/5

[Sarah · Rating 1 out of 5]

This book fell behind behind my bed some time last November. I have not yet bothered to pick it up off the floor, nor do I intend to.

[Emily]

A beautiful backlist coming-of-age gem. Found in a little free library otherwise it may never have been on my radar—glad I picked this up!

[Suzie Weber · Rating 3 out of 5]

Descriptions and imagery were beautiful. The plot was a bit untethered and boring at times but mostly I enjoyed it!

[Novak · Rating 5 out of 5]

i like this book!! i feel like it’s not a plot-based book but more just an exploration of experience. it made me think and feel!! good things!

[Bookguide · Rating 2 out of 5]

Unfortunately I was disappointed in this book; I had expected more insight into the Japanese-American experience. I first registered this book onon BookCrossing ten years ago and kept it so long because I’m interested in the immigrant and expat experience. This book failed to deliver on its promise, partly because Kadohata was protected from the reality of ‘otherness’ by her stepfather, the almost always cheerful Charlie-O, who had enough money to buy into half of a garage business in Arkansas. This lent a stability to Kadohata’s childhood that many other Japanese immigrants did not have, working as itinerant farmhands or food processors.

When translating her grandmother’s diaries, she comments on being bilingual, an experience many expats and immigrants share.
“I liked the two languages, Japanese and English, how each contained thoughts you couldn’t express exactly in the other. For instance, because you didn’t use spaces between words in the same way in English and Japanese, certain phrases - such as “pure white” or “eight slender objects” or “how many people “ - seemed to me like only one word in Japanese. Seeming to use only one word changed slightly the meaning of what I was saying. It made me think about what exactly was pure white and not merely white.” (p.110)
It was quite amazing how the Japanese community managed to stay in touch over long distance and time, traveling frequently to visit each other, but there is no Japanese flavour to this story. Apart from the rice triangles Kadohata prepared as one of her chores, placing one on her grandmother’s shrine in their house. I did enjoy the all-too-brief description of the house:
“Intricate lace curtains hung in all the windows, but none of the curtains matched, and baskets, statuettes and pottery sat in every corner. Nothing matched, yet it all matched.” (p.83)

Later on, she describes the feeling she had had as a young child travelling across country with the family in their car. Moving into her first flat, “I liked where I lived. It gave me that old feeling of being displaced and safe at the same time, like when I used to play in the small woods back of my house at night. I could close my eyes and from any point at the edge find my way to a certain tree in the center.” (p.155)

Another unforgettable influence in the book is the grouchy grandmother, Obāsan, who makes the children’s lives a misery. The child Kadohata feels responsible for her death because she didn’t tell her mother that her grandmother needed help. Quite a terrible secret to have.

The problem with this book is that it is not much more than isolated stories, many of them not particularly interesting because they could simply be describing any childhood with a certain background. And that background is not particularly immigrant or Japanese.

[Paula Koneazny · Rating 3 out of 5]

I am such a fan of Kadohata's post-apocalyptic In the Heart of the Valley of Love (1992), which I read many years ago that I've been hoping ever since for a new novel by this author. Alas! It appears that she now writes solely for young readers. The Floating World is Kadohata's first novel (1989). It's an elegant and often quirky coming-of-age story, well-written and enjoyable to read. Olivia, the "heroine," recounts the somewhat non-linear story of her childhood, adolescence, and young adulthood in an itinerant Japanese-American family, moving around the American West in the 1950s. After years on the road, they finally settle down in Gibson in rural Arkansas in a community of Japanese-Americans who primarily work in the local chicken hatcheries, sexing chicks. Kadohata writes with great understanding of the idiosyncrasies of each member of a family, as well as the ties that bind them together.

[Jane · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a novel which is actually a series of linked stories about life in an itinerant Japanese family. The narrator, the oldest girl, Olivia, has a detached narrative voice. The descriptions of her work at the chicken hatchery, the area of Arkansas in which she lives and her relationship with her grandmother are evocative and sometimes frightening. It's a really interesting, but not compelling in the way most novels are. For example, there's something so much life an essay-quality to these chapters. I was never sure when a chapter was ending. I literally couldn't tell by the tone or the ending of a particular narrative. Strange, but really well written. I'm left waiting to see how feel about this. Will it continue to haunt me? Will it be memorable simply because it is so different in tone? It's about a world I don't know. And perhaps, having this window on it, I'll eventually realize how compelling it actually was for me. It's labled YA...definitely not, as far as I'm concerned.

[Alton Motobu · Rating 4 out of 5]

Life in 1950s America seen through the eyes of a young Japanese-American girl whose family travels across the US working various jobs from California to Arkansas. Vignettes about growing up in Japanese-American communities, working on chicken farms, first loves, conflicts with parents, then going to Los Angeles for college. Somewhat reminiscent of A Tree Grows in Brooklyn in tone and characterizations. If you are a Japanese-American you will recognize people you know or your own family members. If you are interested in learning about the Japanese-American experience in post WW2 America, this will be a valuable read.

[Pam · Rating 3 out of 5]

I originally read it because I was interested in reading a memoir by a Japanese-American writer. This book was not what I expected. Each chapter felt like a vignette of the narrator's transition from childhood to adulthood. The setting was very similar to her book, Kira Kira. Both books take place in the south with parents working in chicken processing plants. It was very different from the Japanese-American experience here in the bay area, I think.

[Noam · Rating 4 out of 5]

An interesting book about how a girl with an unusual and highly mobile family grows up and develops her own personality, morality and understanding of "home".

I happened to read this side-by-side with The Glass Castle which made for an interesting study in intersectionality, especially since the two families lived in a few similar places at similar times.

[Richard · Rating 4 out of 5]

A worthwhile read. A personal tale of dealing with a strict Grandma and life growing up Japanese-American, mainly in Arkansas in the 50s and 60s, from a girl's perspective. Relatively short sentences; descriptions don't bog down. You get a good sense of the personal experience of family and surroundings, observed with a light smile when it can be mustered.

[Lydia Cox · Rating 1 out of 5]

The book was written as a memoir, so it was basically a lot of random events thrown together. No character development - you were never drawn in to any one person, or even liked any of them. The writing style did not flow, and serious events were thrown in haphazardly with casual conversations. Hardly a coming of age novel, as the main character does not seem to develop any morals or maturity.

[Bill · Rating 5 out of 5]

Just because a character has a fucked-up childhood doesn't mean that they go on to greatness or despair. Too bad Kadohata moved onto being a children's author.

[Alessandra Simmons · Rating 2 out of 5]

Interesting story, look at the US from POV of coming of age japanese american. It read like a memoir. Why did it read like a memoir? I can't quite figure itout.

[Melinda · Rating 1 out of 5]

I've read much better coming-of-age stories. This one was an example of lazy storytelling for me. Nothing quite connected or meant very much. A disappointment after reading Danticat's novel.

[Apteryx · Rating 3 out of 5]

A very interesting read.

[Frances · Rating 2 out of 5]

2.5 stars. Found this in a book store on a trip years ago and finally read it. The author has written for magazines and this book felt like multiple magazine stories loosely tied together. A coming of age story, it did explore relationships with family members and a few special friends. But it did not capture me.

[Carl · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a strange book. It has a few very nice character and scenic descriptions, but in general, it reads much more like a memoir. It is very disjointed with some odd jumps backward and forward in time. There is no real story arc; other than, the main character grows up, but we don't even get any reflection on what that means. And then, it just ends.

[Leonika Hariananta · Rating 4 out of 5]

One word to describe this book is 'bittersweet'. The story is going everywhere and nowhere at all. Jumping through Olivia's one memory lane to another where everything unfolded every time in front of you. I feel like nothing written here was important to the plot, but it is important only to Olivia. And that's how life is, especially life for people at Olivia's age.

[April · Rating 3 out of 5]

All I remember is that I liked it and it's worth reading. (I'm cleaning out our library and garage and reviewing the old books I read.) I liked it enough to keep it at the time, but now I'm letting it go. I hope someone else enjoys it.

[A. · Rating 4 out of 5]

Liminal, dreamlike, but rooted in deep, grounding, vivid sensory detail. It reads as both coming of age and memoir, as if Olivia were talking to you.

[Jennifer Serenity · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book introduced me to the historical fact that Japanese Americans in the USA were put in labor camps during World War II. I was shocked.

I read the book in college in 1994.