Kira-Kira

Kira-Kira Summary | Plot Summary

Kira-Kira is a novel about a young Japanese girl, Katie Takeshima, growing up in the late 1950s and early 1960s. Though she lives in a volatile time, she is oblivious to everything around her except the security of her family's love. That cocoon of love is slowly shattered, however, beginning with a move that takes her family from the familiar cornfields of Iowa to Georgia.

At five, Katie believes Georgia is a foreign land where everyone speaks with such a strong southern accent that she will never be able to understand a word they have to say. Imagine her surprise when, within a few short months, she finds herself speaking with that same thick accent as though she had been born there.

Life is much different in Georgia for Katie and her family. In order to save for a home of their own, Katie's parents must work long, hard hours. Her father quite often spends the night at the poultry hatchery where he works as a chicken sexer. Katie hardly ever gets to see her parents anymore. She spends most of her days with one of their Japanese neighbors, waiting only for the moment when her sister Lynn will come home from school and play with her. When she herself is old enough to start school, Katie hates every moment of it, unsure what is so special about reading and figuring out math problems all day long. Not only that, but the year she starts first grade, Katie's mother gives birth to another child. Now Katie is not the youngest child any longer, but suddenly a big sister expected to help care for her new little brother, Sammy.

Dislike of school or not, Katie soon learns to accept this new world her parents have brought her to. Time flies by, first grade turning into second, then third and fourth. Pretty soon, it is Katie's tenth birthday and Lynn has a new best friend. At first, Katie accepts this with all the generosity of a child who admires and loves her older sister. It's not so easy to understand, though, when Lynn and Amber begin walking around the living room with books on their heads, giggling and whispering about boys all the time. Katie is glad Lynn has a friend, but sometimes she wishes that Lynn had more time to just be silly with Katie.

It is soon after Amber enters their lives that Lynn starts to become ill. At first, she is simply tired all the time. The doctor comes and gives Lynn iron pills and Katie's parents say she just needs to rest and eat more liver. Lynn is sick so often that summer, Katie and Sammy have to go to work with their mother because there is no one else to watch after them. At first, sitting alone in the car all day long is hot and boring. That is, until Katie meets Silly. Maybe now Katie can have a best friend of her own.

Meeting Silly is not the only exciting thing to happen that summer. Since it is Lynn who has always harbored the secret wish to have a home of her own, Katie's parents go to the bank and take out a loan in order to buy a house sooner than originally planned. Lynn feels so much better once they are moved into the new house; she and Katie plan a picnic to celebrate. They find a nice field on unfenced property in town, owned by the owner of the poultry plant and the hatchery, Mr. Lyndon, to share doughnuts and root beer. After lunch, Sammy wanders off to explore the woods and he steps into an animal trap. The jaw of the trap has huge teeth that grab onto Sammy's ankle until Katie is sure it has been cut off. She runs into town to get help when it is clear she and Lynn cannot carry him out on their own. Fortunately, Sammy has not broken any bones and he will be fine.

If only Lynn were not sick so much. Lynn has to go into the hospital the October after Katie's eleventh birthday. Katie spends that fall with Sammy and her father at the hatchery instead of in school, which is okay with her. When Lynn finally comes home, Katie spends every minute she can taking care of her, and when she isn't taking care of her, she is thinking of new ways she can help Lynn.

It is the day after New Year's and Katie has gotten up early to watch the sunrise alone outside their little house. She falls asleep and the next thing she is aware of is her father carrying her into the house. "She is gone," her father simply says.

After they come and take Lynn's body away, Katie's father becomes very agitated as he watches Sammy limp across the kitchen after dinner. He decides to take Katie and find the trap that hurt his son. They drive to the middle of the field and Katie waits a long time while her father searches the woods. Finally, he comes back. Instead of going home, though, he drives up to Mr. Lyndon's house and breaks the windshield of his Cadillac with a two-by-four. Afterward they drive until they reach the next town, then Katie's father pulls over. Seconds later, a police car comes up behind them and a cop asks Katie's father what they are doing. "Going to get tacos," Katie tells him. The cop tells them what happened at Mr. Lyndon's house. It is clear he believes it is Katie's father who broke the car's window, but his car is not the same color as the one a witness saw. When Katie tells him what happened to her sister, the cop lets them go.

Katie is asked to make a speech at Lynn's funeral. She is very nervous. She has never understood the concept of theme as it applies to literature, but she wants very much to understand what it means when applied to her sister's life. When she stands up in front of all those people, she is even more nervous, feeling as if she will never make it through. She tells the crowd about her sister's dream of living in California beside the sea. She tells them how much Lynn had wanted to be a rocket scientist or a great writer. She tells them how Lynn would be the greatest at everything and how she would take her family with her. This, Katie says, is the theme of Lynn's life.

Katie talks to her Uncle Katsuhisa after the funeral. She feels guilty because one night when Lynn was very sick, they fought and Katie said that she hated her. Uncle Katsuhisa tells her not to worry because Lynn knew she didn't mean it. Besides, he says, when someone is that ill, it makes you do things you would not normally do. He knows because he and Aunt Fumi once had an infant that was very sick. He once had terrible thoughts about hurting the baby, but he did not do it. It was only his grief talking.

Uncle Katsuhisa helps Katie build an altar for Lynn. Katie takes care of it every day. Her family believes Lynn's spirit will remain on earth for forty-nine days after her body died. On the forty-ninth day, Katie closes her eyes and tries to feel Lynn's spirit before it goes. When she opens her eyes after her wish, she sees a leaf stick to the window above the desk. That is a sign from Lynn, she thinks. Katie prays for Lynn not to worry about her anymore. She knows it is not possible for Lynn to come back to life, so she does not wish for that.

Slowly life begins to return to normal. The union people had been trying to organize at the poultry processing plant is voted in. Katie's mother and father go back to their crazy work schedules. One day, Uncle Katsuhisa finds out that Mr. Lyndon has decided not to give his workers a raise that year. When he tells Katie's father, Katie says maybe her father should break Mr. Lyndon's car window again. Father takes Katie to Mr. Lyndon's house and he admits to him that he had broken the windshield. Mr. Lyndon fires Katie's father. Katie is upset because this is very bad news for her struggling family. Her father says it's okay; it's time to move on anyway. Besides, a person should never be afraid to apologize for something he did.

That summer, the Takeshima family takes a vacation to California. As Katie stands on the beach, she remembers Lynn. "Kira-kira," she can hear her call. "Kira-kira."