Displacement

This book explores family history and heritage, but this time with time travel. The art here is gorgeous, and I love how Kiku discovers more about her family’s legacy of resilience and strength through her time travel.

Kiku Hughes’s graphic novel is about a girl in San Francisco who travels back in time to witness her grandmother’s interment. My kid said, “Displacement brings up important issues and talks about historical events while having an interesting story. I feel like that’s hard to do. It’s also a graphic novel with really nice art.”

My kid thought it was a really thought-provoking read, and she kept talking about it for months afterward.

This book depicts the complexities of generational trauma. Kiku, our protagonist, discovers that she can go back in time and experience what her ancestors went through during the second world war. Kiku Hughes dives into the daily lives of citizens living in Japanese internment camps. It’s a brave look at the complicated relationship a person can have with the place they live in, given the difficulties their ancestries have gone through. Also, Kiku Hughes is an amazing illustrator. The bulk of the storytelling is through her depictions of the United States throughout different decades.