Kimchi & Calamari (review)

A school assignment about his ancestry leaves fourteen-year-old Joseph with questions: why doesn't his Italian-American family talk to him about his adoption from Korea, where did he come from there, and what does his Korean origin mean? Uncomfortable with taking the matter directly to his parents, he seeks his birth mother on the Internet and garners information from a new Korean classmate, but he makes the situation worse for himself by inventing a heritage for his ancestry project. The fallout brings the subject out into the open at home, though, and Joseph begins to explore his multilayered legacy. This is a situation that many kids will recognize, and the book is particularly perceptive about the tendency of an adopted kid to get put in the position of caretaker to his parents, protecting them from his own history even as he's hoping for more access to it. The contrast between Joseph and his Korean buddy Yongsu helps make the point about the different ways one can be influenced by one's country of origin and country of residence. The book never really faces the either/or myth head-on, though, and it tends to be more programmatic than effective; the writing's pedestrian tendencies underscore the sometimes hackneyed characterization. This therefore lacks the nuance of Marie G. Lee's similarly themed If It Hadn't Been for Yoon Jun (BCCB 3/93), but this is an undertreated topic, and readers thinking about issues of heritage and legacy may find this an unintimidating way to ease into the subject.