New novel explores growing up Japanese-American

David Mura
David Mura is known as a poet, an essayist and a performer. Now he has published his first novel, "Famous Suicides of the Japanese Empire."
Photo by John Noltner, courtesy Coffeehouse Press

Twin Cities writer David Mura says his novel, "Famous Suicides of the Japanese Empire," was inspired years ago when he read a story about the son of a "no-no boy."

No-no boys were pariahs in the Japanese-American community. They were men who refused to take a loyalty oath to the U.S. while being held in the internment camps for people of Japanese descent at the start of World War II.

Book cover
Details from the cover of "Famous Suicides of the Japanese Empire."
Image courtesy Coffeehouse Press

Mura's central character, Ben Ohara, is the son of a no-no boy. The book follows him as he comes to understand the pressures which have shaped his life.

This is Mura's first novel. He told Minnesota Public Radio's Euan Kerr taking the loyalty oath was not as simple a proposition as it might seem.

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