Customer Reviews

Tonoharu: Part One

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

 

 

Tonoharu is a beautiful, true to life graphic novel. I taught English in Fukuoka for three years with the JET Programme, and even though this book presents some extreme examples of what can happen, the most outrageous thing is how factual it actually is. Nuanced, detailed, funny and sad, it really captures the spirit of what it's like to be a foreigner in Japan, the high highs and the lonely lows. I definitely recommend it to all JET alums and all those interested in seeing Japan through Western eyes. If you like manga, it will give you a deeper appreciation of the culture. Those who haven't been to Japan but enjoyed the movie Lost in Translation will feel a similar sense of lyrical dislocation as they follow the adventures of Daniel in Tonoharu.

A serious minority - Daniel Wells is the only American in a rural Japanese Village, where he serves as an assistant junior high school teacher. "Tonoharu: Part One" is the start of his story as Daniel must deal with everything coming with his new job - language barriers, culture shock, it's a lonely existence. His only relief comes from the pursuit, although not effective, of an American girl who resides in a town not far from his own. His adventures often turn offbeat and intriguing, making "Tonoharu: Part One" highly recommended for community library graphic novel collections.

Diane C. Donovan
California Bookwatch

I have just finished reading the graphic novel Tonoharo Vol. 1 for the third time in a week.

The basic story is about an American who moves to Japan to teach english.

I lived in Fukuoka Japan for 3-years and taught "conversational" english at a company called GEOS. I started to go slightly "bonkers" my last 6 months or so and left a bit burnt out and I've never been back.

Some of this story is based in and around Fukuoka so it brings back some memories for me.

Many people have asked what it was like to live and work in Japan and I've told and discussed it with them to the best of my ability.

The writer does an excellent job of catching some of the subtlety and small detail that comes with living as a foreigner in Japan, and expresses some of the frustrations being a foreigner.

My experiences were quite a bit different than what is portrayed in the story but many similar things happened to me.

And, strangely enough, I knew people that lead lives very similar to the characters in the graphic novel. I also knew people that led lives very different but still went thru the same experiences and process of living there.

I'm not sure if I got so much out of this because I lived there or the writer does such a good job.

If your at all interested in the subject of expats in Japan, this is a graphic novel that you should read.

Volume 2 has just come out but I haven't had a chance to purchase it yet but I will.

I left for Japan with great expectations too, embarking on a year's adventure teaching English for Aeon that quickly soured and nearly marooned me. I missed out on JET, possibly because I'd just turned 30 (old in Japanese years?) so I took the next best offer. The parallels between my experience and Dan's are many and reading this graphic novel made a lot of forgotten emotions come flooding back. My biggest gripe after a year there and returning home is the perception amongst those who haven't been that it's a Utopian society of empathic people reading Murakami and watching Miyazaki movies. It isn't - not by a long shot. What we as Westerners know about Japan is idealized and highly filtered. Reading Tonoharu provides an inkling of the actual reality.

The line drawings are spare, manga-esque and evoke the place well. My only (vague) criticism with the novel is its brevity; I'd like more for my $$ but at the same time I'm glad to support a talented artist and will certainly buy the sequels.

For the record: I quit my job with Aeon after my employer invented new, non-corporate rules such as no student friendships and others too absurd to fill this space with. I found another school in Tsukuba where I was treated well and finished my tenure without incident. Sometimes I consider going back ... but then again reading Tonoharu is probably sufficient.

I really enjoyed this book, it managed to capture a lot of the emotions you go through spending time in Japan, without being particularly judgmental or drawing conclusions for you. Its kind of "yep this is some of the experiences and feelings of the place".

I'm not generally big on memoir or semi-autobiographical fiction as a genre (especially in graphic formats, where the navel-gazing can get totally out of hand), but the beautiful cover and interior artwork of this book grabbed my attention. Labeled "Part One," it begins to tell the story of a 25-year-old American from Connecticut who has moved to Japan to teach English, and the cultural dislocation that results. Dan is posted in a fictional town, which, while not exactly rural, is small enough that he's the only American there. We follow his early months of struggling to connect with the teachers at his school and a nice American girl who's teaching English a 30-minute train ride away.

It's not at all clear what he's doing in Japan (these jobs require no background in either teaching or Japanese), but since this is his first job since college, the odds are that he's got some kind of problem. This is borne out over the course of the story, as the rather pathetic Dan flops miserably at every social encounter, and can't seem to engage with his new surroundings. Which is not to belittle the culture shock of such an extreme change (I've been to Japan and seen firsthand just how alien it can feel), but it's also hard not to get fed up with his sad sack demeanor. I have four friends who've taught English in Japan, and they all managed to overcome the problems and have great experiences, some in even more extreme isolation than that depicted here.

The author brings plenty of first-hand experience to the table, having taught English in Japan for three years in a large city, and captures the fish out of water scenario wonderfully. He's also clearly absorbed some of the Japanese graphic sensibilities, as the book unfolds in beautifully precise panels, with clean lines, great background detail, and subtle color washes. It's a case of form being married perfectly to the tone and is definitely worth checking out if you've got an interest in Japan. And while Dan is not the kind of protagonist that elicits sympathy, I am curious to see if he's able to change at all in Part Two.

Lars Martinson's graphic novel "Tonoharu" is the story of Daniel Wells, an American who goes to teach English for a year in the titular backwaters Japanese town. He is the only foreigner for miles, except for a group of temple-dwelling European ex-pats whom he meets only briefly. Daniel himself hovers just this side of "loveable loser," a sympathetic character with emphasis on the pathetic. He is alone, barely speaks Japanese, and his job requirements are--to him--largely opaque.

In the wrong hands this story might have felt pedestrian, but Martinson makes the characters who populate his slice of Japan thoroughly believable, such that by the end of the relatively short "Part One," I was eager to find out what quotidian struggle would engulf Daniel next.

In fact, what I admired again and again in Tonoharu was its truthfulness. The author/artist spent several years in Japan doing the same thing as his main character, and his depictions of the country will be instantly familiar to anyone who has spent time there. Although Martinson's backgrounds are never crowded, the details he chooses to include--from the look of a residential town to the Key Coffee sign that appears in one panel--are all utterly true to life. In the same way, his dialogue feels totally natural, and the joy of it (paradoxically) is that he has captured even the most embarrassing ex-pat tics with an intimacy only someone who's been there could have achieved. (In one scene, for instance, Daniel's slightly drunken predecessor says to him, "The Japanese are fine, but I dunno...it's like you can't have a normal conversation with them.") It is this attention to detail that elevates Japan from mere backdrop to true setting for the story.

The page layouts in the book are clean, almost always consisting of four equally-sized square panels on each page. There is a risk that such an arrangement might become dry after a hundred pages, but this is not an action comic; the deliberate layout almost seems to reflect the measured plod of Daniel's life, adding to the sense of his resignation.

Some things do bother me: Martinson's dialogue shows a marked aversion to commas (and periods). Moreover, word balloons, which are not very defined to begin with, are often run together so it's not always obvious which of two or more characters is speaking. Either or both of these traits may be deliberate; as far as I'm concerned they're quibbles, not deal breakers.

The book, however, may not appeal to readers without a particular interest in Japan. I was drawn to it because, having spent a year in that country as a student, I looked at almost every background or conversation and felt pangs of recognition. Failing the chance to get that out of the book, its charm as an exploration of life in Japan may be somewhat lost. About the idiosyncrasies of that life, though, few books are so honest.

~

As someone who has spent time teaching in Japan and written about it (For Fukui's Sake: Two years in rural Japan) I was really keen to read Tonoharu.

As a piece of art, the entire book is a thing of beauty. The artwork is excellent with superb attention to detail, lovely clean lines and great backdrops so that the scenery, the architecture and the everyday objects are very accurately depicted. (If you like Guy Delisle's work eg: Pyongyang: A Journey in North Korea - you'll like Tonoharu).

I have two criticisms; firstly - it's too short. I finished it in less than an hour, and for over £12 - I wanted more page for my pound.

Secondly, the storyline was a little disappointing. The book follows the life of 'Dan' a young American working in a rural(ish) town (called Tonoharu). But rather than showing us the excitement of life as a foreigner in Japan, Dan doesn't seem to have any fun at all. I don't think a single frame depicts him smiling, laughing or in awe of the incredible country he is now living in.

Instead of the "Wow! Japan!" excitement that most foreigners feel upon arrival, the comic depicts a lonely existence for an isolated Dan with no 'get up and go' who spends his time mooching around, head hung low, fawning over an American girl who is way out of his league.

Although almost all foreigners in Japan do experience such periods of bewilderment and isolation, what Tonoharu omits is the other side of life there; the incredibly enriching experience where every day is an adventure into the unknown - if only you embrace it.

The scenes of Dan in school are really well done and are accurate accounts of what it's like to work as an ALT (or AET) on the JET Programme and because I love the artwork - I think this book is worth 4 stars.

I just hope we'll see Dan's lust for life appear in the sequels so we get to enjoy the more positive and adventurous aspects of living in this fascinating country.

I just read this book in one short sitting, and I feel the same as I do when I hear that sad "Christmastime is here" song from Charlie Brown's Christmas...nostalgic, a little sad, as if something deep has been accessed within me. Part One tells the story of Dan, a 25-year old American who is an assistant teacher in a small Japanese town, and who is discovering that moving to another place - even an exotic place - doesn't automatically let you reinvent yourself. He's awkward, lonely and bored, just like the life he left in the US. There's not much action or dramatic tension in Part One per se, but the clean drawings and the many short, sometimes one-panel vignettes of life in a foreign place ring true even for those of us who haven't been to Japan.

Tonoharu is interesting because it gives valuable insight into what it's like to be an extreme outsider. It's also dead-on when addressing one's desperate desire to converse with someone attune to his cultural sensibilities.

The reader empathizes with Daniel because he is the town's lone American resident, his English teaching job description is annoyingly vague, and he strikes out with the American girl of a nearby town. On the other hand, he is somewhat of a downer - he struggles with a self-introduction assignment because his two main interests are sleeping and watching TV - so it's sort of hard to root for him.

Despite the "downerness," the book was enjoyable. The art was cool and there were some very funny parts; my favorite was Daniel's conversational slip-up when Constance talks about the Japanese youngsters groaping her. Creative and different, I enjoyed reading this book.