Customer Reviews

The Sign Of The Chrysanthemum (Turtleback School & Library Binding Edition)

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(8)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(5)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

I really enjoyed this book and read it in about two hours (it is a short book). I am a Chinese lady teaching 12th grade English and I am sure all my students will enjoy this book, and also any grades from 9th onwards, because of its universal themes of search for identity, how it encapsulates the adventurous spirit of Feudal Japan, and its simple language which manages to be so evocative at the same time. For all those who didn't enjoy reading or teaching the book, may I suggest that you let your students watch some extremely popular Japanese Animation series about Feudal Japan like Rurouni Kenshin and Inuyasha before reading this book. Katherine Paterson's book reads exactly like a a great Anime series and I could picture the whole thing in my mind, background music and scenery included, and it was beautiful. So beautiful. Anyone with even a vague knowledge of feudal era Anime, or Japanese Culture and History of the Heian period will realise how accurately Paterson has portrayed the Japanese ideals of 'honour' and 'family'. She also deliberately tones down her writing style to match the simple sentence structures and restrained style of many East Asian writers, and this would be useful to know when comparing this book stylistically with her other works.

The book starts off with a boy named Muna, the nameless one, whos mother just passed away. He now wants to look for his warrior father so that he would be able to be highly respected and change his name of his 14th birthday to a name more proper for a man, but the only thing he knows about his father is that he has a chrysanthemun tattoo and a he is a Heike warrior.
I thought this book was quite good. It had many dialogues, a good storyline, and some action. Most of all, I liked how the book was easy to understand.

I think this was a great book. It was about a boy named Muna. Muna has never known his father because he left before Muna was born. So, after Muna's mother died, Muna went in search of his father. Muna meets many news people along the way and lives with a swordsmith. you have to read the rest of the book to find out what happens next. But, I would highly recommend it, especially to seventh graders studying fuedal Japan. I give this book two thumbs up!!!

I recommend this to students and teachers because it was a very good book. This book is about a Japanese teenage boy in Feudalk Japan. His mother died and he is on a journey to find his father. The only thing he knows about his father is that he was a samurai and he had a chrysanthemum tattoo on his shoulder. When he goes to find his father, he encounters many things. If you like adventure books, then you should get this.

If you are up for a great adventure this is the book for you. This story is about a young boy named Muna who was sent out by his mother to find his long lost father. Muna encounters many heart thrilling challenges durring his quest to find his father. I reccomend this book to everyone espeacially to those 7th graders who are studying "Feudal Japan"

I give this book a two thumbs up!!!

This is a wonderful story about an orphan boy in feudal Japan who searches for his samurai father but ends up finding himself instead. I teach 7th grade, and my students LOVE this book! It was the only book all year that even my lowest students enjoyed reading. Don't miss it!

I thought the book was a good book but wasn't appealing to me as it would be to some people. The plot is somewhat boring, there no "great" scenes and the conflict is just dragging on. There are no new occurrences, and when they happen to show up you know its going to happen. Every chapter repeats the same thing and when something new happens to change the plot it repeats for two more chapters. This book does have some up points though. The setting is very well placed with many historical and cultural facts popping up here and there. The theme is a good one and it's not to mushy, and it has a good ending; the characters are good, but a lot of them are your basic line up of people in a story. The drawings aren't very good and are just there to please the junior high students reading this with there teacher. This book is good for children to read and to learn about ancient Japan and that's why it was given out. I would not suggest reading this on your own time but if you're a teacher wanting your students to read and stand by the curriculum this is a perfectly good book. I give this book a C- for helpful information but an uninteresting reading experience.

This book was fairly good. Muna is a boy whos mother just past away. Because Muna's mother past away, he decides to search for his father whom Muna knows a little of. Muna learned from his mother that his father was a samurai and had a chrysanthemun tattoo on his shoulder. After his mother's burial, Muna leaves on his adventure. I think this book was fairly good because it had a great storyline. The end was the most terrific part because no one would have saw it coming.

This is a great book. I recommend this to teacher to assign to their students. The reason why is for teachers who are teaching their students about feudal Japan. It is action packed book. I recommend it to students and children who enjoy knight-like sumarai. I really enjoy this book. I have this book at least three times. I also recommend this to people who want to learn about the life of feudal Japan. This book is about a boy named Muna, a boy looking for his father. Dreaming about how his father looks like. He lives on the information that his father is a samarai warrior. He looks for a sign of the chrysanthemum. He sneaks on a ship.

Back when we knew very little about Japanese history

of culture this was a very good introduction.

Shogun was new and ideas of how this culture was just another culture.

The Rape of Nanking seems to have these innocent dreams about Japanese being "like" us? This book gives a good introduction to the Samurai based society of medieval Japan at a time when Knights roamed England on deeds of chivalry and cathedrals were being built. A system based on Christian ethics is very different than one based on Bushido. But the societies are surprising alike on the surface.