It’s Children’s Book Week! To celebrate, I’m reviewing American Born Chinese by Gene Luen Yang. It’s more correctly in the age group of “Young People” literature, but it’s my blog and I make the rules. So there. Note: Click on the images for (slightly) larger versions. For bigger versions still, go buy the book.

American Born Chinese is recognized as not just a great graphic book (“comic book” doesn’t quite fit it), but in the literary world as well. It was a finalist for the 2006 National Book Award in the category of Young People’s Literature, and the recipient of the prestigious Michael L. Printz Award in 2007. For some reason, book awards are more meaningful than other media awards and this is no exception.

American Born Chinese tells three stories that are thematically unified but distinct from and compliment each other. Alternating chapters so you don’t get to the end of one story before you start another, the book is tightly woven together with a common thread that makes it all work. It’s hard to describe but easy to follow, and Yang pulls off well. There’s a massive twist at the end of one of the stories that I’m going to ATTEMPT not to give away. Let’s start with the first story. (These two pages are not in sequence.)

We begin with Jin Wang, a young boy with Chinese parents (the titular American Born Chinese) who learns how to deal with racism, both subtle and stark, after he moves to a predominately white area from San Fransisco’s Chinatown. As his teacher mispronounces his name and other kids make fun of him, Jin distances himself from the one Asian girl in his class and later, the Taiwanese boy (Wei-Chen Sun, above right) who moves to town. As Jin tries to integrate into the class, he makes changes that deny his heritage.

The rejection that Jin feels is present from page one of American Born Chinese and his decisions are childish. Interesting, though, that adults make the same mistakes. If I look and act like everybody else, we think, maybe they’ll accept me. In Jin’s case, he goes so far as to perm his hair like a popular white student’s. It looks silly on him, but his hope is that people will forget, or maybe not even notice, that he’s different.

The second story is a charming re-telling of an old Chinese story first told in Journey To the West by Wu Chen-en in the 1500s. Gene Luen Yang’s version focuses on the Monkey King, who is dissatisfied with being “just” the King of Flower Fruit Mountain. He masters twelve forms of kung-fu and learns the four major heavenly disciplines, thus achieving status of deity. Things get complicated when the Monkey King is kicked out of a dinner party in heaven. Eventually, he is visited by Tze-Yo-Tzuh (above) and things do not go well.

The Monkey King’s rejection is similar to Jin’s, but he has the power to force people (and other gods) to accept him. Yang leads the young readers (and us old guys) of American Born Chinese to explore the universal power fantasy, the “I’ll Make Them PAY” daydreams that Ralphie has in A Christmas Story. He shows us that even if you could beat others into submission, the ultimate good that must be achieved is for you to accept yourself as you are. Others’ acceptance is secondary.

Finally, we come to the Danny’s story. It’s offensive on purpose, running through the list of bad Asian stereotypes and a few good ones to boot. He comes to visit his cousin Danny, a blond-haired, blue-eyed High School student who, though he is an All-American type of guy, has to deal with the funny looks and mean-spirited jabs when his cousin Chin-Kee comes to town. Danny is just getting settled in his new school when Chin-Kee visits and ruins everything.

About the offensiveness of Chin-Kee’s story: Yang put it in there for a reason. One of the saving graces of Chin-Kee’s story is the running gag of the studio audience reaction at the bottom of the panels. It effectively pulls the offensiveness from being taken seriously and pushes it over into farce.

Danny’s afraid of people not accepting him, but not because of something in himself, but from an outside source. The lesson remains the same, though; hide from people, whether it’s your ethnicity, your family, or whatever else, and you’re in for trouble. Accept who you are and let the chips fall where they may, even if it means you might face negative consequences. It’s an important lesson that everyone need to hear.

There’s a line from near the end of American Born Chinese that I really want to quote here, but I can’t because it would give everything away. I’m betting that people who’ve read the book know which one I’m talking about, and when you read it, you’ll be able to pick it out too. It’s one sentence that has literally changed my life. I hope it has the same effect on you.

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I sat down to watch Anchors Aweigh last Saturday, forgetting that I have to be in just the right frame of mind to watch a musical. There’s a really specific kind of suspension of disbelief that goes along with a musical and if I have trouble with that, the whole experience falls apart.

Anchors Aweigh is what I’d call a Kitchen Sink movie. It’s 2:20 long, and it has a little of everything in it. You want sexual innuendo? You got it. Cute little kids? Sure. Romantic love story? In spades. Guy dancing with a cartoon mouse in a castle where the cartoon animals aren’t allowed to have fun? That’s a bit specific, but what the heck.

It took me a bit to get into it but once I did, it was an enjoyable film. Short version of the plot: Two sailors deal with complications while trying to find romance (wink wink) on shore leave in sunny Hollywood.

Longer version: Our two sailors are Joe Brady (Gene Kelly) and Clarence Doolittle (Frank Sinatra), pictured above. After what must be recognized as just about the gayest scene in cinema ever, in which Kelly lounges on a table while sailors in their undershirts lean in and Sinatra’s face rests alarmingly close to Kelly’s bits and pieces, Doolittle asks Alpha-Male Joe to teach him how to be a ‘wolf’ with the ladies. (Sure, Clarence. The ladies. Now quit resting your head on his shoulder.) Hilarity ensues.

Kelly plays the role he seems to love; that of the jackass playboy whose hard exterior is melted by a woman’s love. He’s very good at the jackass part, I’ll give him that. It was a bit much in this film, though, what with him telling a girl’s perspective suitor that she’s a whore (in the song If You Knew Suzie) so the guy will leave and then being angry when she doesn’t swoon in gratitude.

Sinatra’s voice is impeccable in Anchors Aweigh. He performs several songs, including the mournful I Fall In Love Too Easily. Sinatra also attempts choreography with Gene Kelly, for which he should be commended, but nobody can keep up with Gene Kelly.

Kathryn Grayson (above) costars as Susan Abbott, the virginal romantic foil for the boys. She has a lovely voice, and gets to show it off several times. Assuming she was the one doing the singing voice, Grayson’s range is phenomenal, nearly Julie Andrews-esque, and showcased tremendously in her final number From The Heart Of A Lonely Poet.

I’m not totally sure, but I think Susan is supposed to be of Mexican heritage. Everything except her name and the color of her skin leads me to that conclusion, right down to the fantasy Zorro scene she has with Gene Kelly. It wouldn’t be the first time a studio tried to straddle the fence between inclusiveness and audience expectations, so I think I’m right.

José Iturbi heads up several musical numbers, and though I’m not sure why I’m supposed to know who he is, he’s very talented. The piano orchestra is a rare treat, and it uses the architecture of the Hollywood Bowl very well. The ending of Anchors Aweigh is telegraphed way in advance, to the point where I was almost surprised that there wasn’t a twist of some sort.

If this blog could have sound effects, this right here would be the place to have the record scratch. Look at that angelic boy up there. Isn’t he adorable? Now somebody tell me how in the name of Jumping Jehoshaphat that little boy grew up to be Dean Stockwell?!? That’s just … I wouldn’t have believed it.

Anyway, Stockwell is good in the role of Susan’s orphaned nephew Donald. Cute as a button and quick with a punchline, Donald heads up the Awwww department, kind of like Kelly heads up the jerkface department and Grayson heads up the woman department. (I’m not sure what department Sinatra is in, but man he has the world’s biggest ears!)

There’s a lot going on in Anchors Aweigh, and while some of it falls flat for me, other parts make up the difference. The music is varied and captivating, and the film ends with a good old fashioned happy ending for everybody. Who could hate that?

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Well, it finally happened. My last CD player gave up the ghost in late March. Rather than buying a new CD player, I decided to bite the bullet and get an actual iPod. Ladies and gentlemen…it is awesome.

I decided to go with the iPod Nano (4 gig, 3rd generation) because a) it was cheaper and b) I can’t imagine using all four gigabytes, so what do I need with four extra gigs? So far I’ve filled up three, and there are only a few others that I have to upload. Controls are ridiculously intuitive, the iPod is exactly the right size (physically), and she handles like a dream.

A couple comments/complaints. First, it bugs me that I can’t sync it up with any old media player on my computer; instead I have to use iTunes. For now I’m supplementing iTunes with SharePod, though I’m sure there’s a better option that I haven’t found yet. The reason I’m using SharePod is that iTunes won’t let me transfer my music between my home and work computers. That flat sucks. I get that they don’t want people stealing music, but I purchased this music, and I should be able to do with it what I want.

Another reason I hate iTunes is that I couldn’t log in to download cover art and such unless I gave them my credit card number. Buh? I have no intention of buying anything from you (cough DRM cough), but you want access to my credit card? Not happening.

So I hunkered down and started tracking down and uploading the covers of all the albums I’d uploaded. It was a pain in the neck, but that’s the price you pay for taking a stand. Power to the people and all that. Of course, the job got infinitely easier when I realized I could just use amazon.com’s images. Still, though, it was an unnecessary step caused by an unreasonable demand.

Okay, so I lied. As soon as I got done with the album covers, I heard that Peggle was available for download, but only through iTunes. What can I say? My love for Peggle won out. It’s a good supplement (bit of an energy hog, though) to the three games that came preloaded. Very handy to have for the waiting rooms of life.

I was surprised that there was no power cord included in the package. Yes, I know, it charges from the ‘puter, but what about when that isn’t handy? So I spent a couple bucks on a backup charger, which ended up being for the old iPod Nano and was incompatible with mine, so I had to spend a couple more bucks on one that actually did work. And the charger has been helpful several times in the past couple weeks.

Another late purchase was a protective case. I don’t know why I didn’t think of it when I bought the iPod, but it scratches pretty easily. I tried to go the cheap route and get a rubber-ish cover, but ended up getting a Belkin acrylic cover last weekend. It works much better, covers everything (including the screen), and doesn’t get in the way of the click wheel.

So to sum up: iPod good. iTunes bad. Peggle good. DRM really bad, but that’s another post. And now I get to walk around pretending that I’m in a movie and the music is my soundtrack.

. . .

Don’t judge me.

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