![]() The most notable funny part in this book for me was when the besuboru laded in a merchant's cha. It brings to life Ichiko, and what it must have been like to be a student there during that timeline. It opens a realistic door to Japan during the transition to the modern age and the end of the Samurai. There are strong friendships, and some pretty rough scenes that make the good times all the mor Samurai Shortstop is a commendable book. ![]() ![]() I would also recommend it to students who like reading about school life it would be great to contrast this historical account to the accounts of high school life nowadays.more I could recommend this to any student interested in Japanese or Asian culture. If I could just get some kids to read it, they'd be just as enthralled but I haven't had any success yet. I wish it weren't based on true stories but it is and, let me tell you, life in Japanese high school in the early 20th and late 19th centuries was tough! The blood, gore, and hazing students were expected to endure was appalling. I liked the cover and I've been intrigued by Japanese historical fiction since reading "Memoirs of a Geisha" so I took the book home to read over the weekend. Our school had just received a shipment of new books and teachers were allowed to pick through the collections to add to their libraries. I wish it weren't based on true stories but it is and, let me tell you, life in Ja This is another book I chose by its cover. This is another book I chose by its cover. Expertly researched by debut author Alan Gratz, it’s a sports story and more, about a boy who must choose between two ways of life, but finds a way to bridge them.more And to his surprise, the warrior training guides him to excel at baseball, a sport his father despises as yet another modern Western menace.Īt its heart a novel about a boy who loves baseball, Samurai Shortstop is fascinating, suspenseful, and intense. It’s only when his father decides to teach him the way of the samurai that Toyo grows to better understand his uncle and father. But he grieves for his uncle, a samurai who sacrificed himself for his beliefs, at a time when most of Japan is eager to shed ancient traditions. Toyo is caught up in the competitive world of boarding school, and must prove himself to make the team in a new sport called besuboru. It’s only when his father decides to teach him the way of the samurai that Toyo g Tokyo, 1890. ![]() As the gulf between them grows wider, Toyo searches desperately for a way to prove there is a place for his family’s samurai values in modern Japan.Tokyo, 1890. ![]() It all has something to do with –the way of the warrior–but Toyo doesn’t understand even after his father agrees to teach it to him. And worse, Toyo fears that his father may be next. Although Uncle Koji’s defiant death was supposedly heroic, it has made Toyo question many things about his family’s samurai background. Toyo isn’t afraid to prove himself He’s more troubled by his uncle’s recent suicide. Still, he’s taken aback when the seniors keep him from trying out for the baseball team–especially after he sees their current shortstop. High school can be brutal, even in turn-of-the-century Japan.įrom his first day at boarding school, Toyo Shimada sees how upperclassmen make a sport out of terrorizing the first-years. ![]()
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