The Bamboo Sword by Margi Preus (review)

Yoshi, a Japanese peasant with no real hope of raising his status, idolizes the samurai and secretly practices the skills he observes at his master’s dojo. Jack, second-to-lowliest crewman aboard the U.S. steamship Susquehanna, has no notion of the political firestorm into which he’s sailing as the ship anchors off the forbidden coast of Japan in 1853 on a mission to open Japanese ports to Western trade. The two fictional boys, each with an oblique but important view of the diplomatic confrontation, go about their private affairs until they are thrown together as tensions escalate, and they must rely on each other to dodge partisans who see them as the enemy. Yoshi, who lands in the employ of Manjiro (an historical figure with firsthand knowledge of the United States and American language and customs), listens carefully to the debates among the samurai, who differ on whether Japan’s interests lie in resisting or accommodating the foreigners. Jack, separated from his shipmates while attached to a delegation on shore, is targeted as a monstrous foreigner and runs for his life. Spying and swordplay, set to the tune of an actual historical event, make this a promising storyline for middle-grade readers, but Preus overexplains the background through conveniently overheard dialogues and breathless rhetorical prompts that betray a heavy authorial hand. Nonetheless, this will have appeal as a companion piece to Preus’s Heart of a Samurai; readers whose interest is driven by the history rather than the adventure will also appreciate the Japanese woodcut reproductions, the glossaries for Japanese and nautical terms, and the appended notes on real-life players and political movements. A selected bibliography is included.