Barefoot Gen, Vol. 3: Life After the Bomb [Paperback]

Keiji Nakazawa (Author), Project Gen (Translator)

Book Description

Publication Date: May 2005

Volume three follows Gen, his mother and baby brother as they search for a place to rest in the bomb's aftermath. Facing rejection, hunger and humiliation, they come to realize that they still have--and can share -- self-respect, hope, and inner strength.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

The third volume in Nakazawa's ongoing chronicle of wartime Japan opens in August 1945 as young Gen, his mother and newborn sister prepare to leave the nightmarish remains of Hiroshima in search of an old family friend who may provide them with food and shelter. But the surrounding countryside, unharmed by the blast, has been overrun by refugees from the city. The rural citizens are terrified of the bomb's survivors--many are gruesomely ill with radiation sickness--and, after years of suffering from war-imposed food shorages, are suspicious, cruel and bitterly self-protective, turning away the needy Gen and his ilk. A Hiroshima survivor, Nakazawa pens a bracingly realistic tale of the human consequences of ultimate warfare; his handsome, cartoonish black-and-white illustrations richly detail WW II Japan. Young Gen's courage, determination and amiability are often melodramatically sentimental, but the apocalyptic conditions he and his family must endure are a plausible basis for his transformation from boy to man. Any comic committed to this level of unstinting verisimilitude deserves our attention.
Copyright 1989 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

About the Author

Keiji Nakazawa was six when the atomic bomb dropped on his city. His first published cartoon work appeared in 1963 and he has since has had over fifty book-length serials published. Now retired from cartooning, Nakazawa lives in Tokyo.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 257 pages
• Publisher: Last Gasp (May 2005)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0867195940
• ISBN-13: 978-0867195941
• Product Dimensions: 8.5 x 6.3 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #86,126 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Life After the Bomb, June 10, 2006

By 

Steve Fuson "comics geek" (Beaverton, OR) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: Barefoot Gen, Vol. 3: Life After the Bomb (Paperback)

This is an incredibly moving graphic novel. In order to earn money to feed his mother and infant sister Gen agrees to take care of Mr. Seiji, an artist burned head to toe by the bomb. Mr. Seiji is kept in a room and left to die by his brother and his brother's family. The way in which Mr. Seiji's family treat him, calling him a monster, wishing he would would die so they could stop being incenvenienced, is in direct contrast to the way in which Gen takes care of his mother, and the orphan Ryuta who looks like his dead brother. The story is a perfect metaphor for humanity, civility, and the way in which people treat each other when times are difficult for everyone.

The artwork his excellent. Nakazawa's somewhat cartoony style makes the horrors seem that much more horrific. The burn victims, both living and dead, the maggots crawling through a living person's dead flesh, people vomiting blood, all have an amazing stomach turning impact.

And yet mixed in with all this is Gen's childish love, hope, and optimism. Despite the setting, he and Ryuta manage to find humor and sing songs.

This is a fictional story, but it is based on Kaiji Nakazawa's real life experiences which he went through as a survivor of the Hiroshima bombing. The names of some of the characters are the names of his family. The stories he tells are harsh and real and painful and good. Literature, in any medium, doesn't get any better than this.