The Emperor of Any Place

Starred review from July 20, 2015
Wynne-Jones (Blink & Caution) deftly blends realism and fantasy in this eerie tale featuring Evan, a high school student mourning his late father, and Griff, the crusty grandfather Evan meets for the first time. Evan always knew that his
ex-Marine grandfather and draft-dodger father never saw eye to eye, but he wasn’t aware of his grandfather’s unearthly encounters during WWII until he discovers the mysterious diary of a Japanese soldier. When Griff shows up at Evan’s door, Evan is immediately put off by his grandfather’s controlling tendencies, but his curiosity is piqued. Could this be the same man mentioned in the diary, who visited an island filled with flesh-eating monsters and the ghosts of unborn children? Readers will be swept up quickly in the tense relationship between Evan and Griff, as well as the unlikely friendship between enemy soldiers fighting for survival in a surreal landscape. Without spelling out the metaphoric significance of the story within the story, Wynne-Jones provides enough hints for readers to make connections and examine the lines between war and peace, as well as hate and love. Ages 14–up. Agent: Barry Goldblatt, Barry Goldblatt Literary.

Starred review from October 1, 2015

Gr 9 Up-An ambitious treatise on grief, war, memory, and the bonds between fathers and sons. Evan is 16 when his beloved father dies suddenly at home. Evan has no other family, so his estranged grandfather, Griff, whom he has never met, flies in to help him settle the affairs. The source of the family schism was the Vietnam War, when Evan's hippie father moved to Canada to dodge the draft, infuriating his father, a lifelong Marine. While going through his father's belongings, Evan happens upon a Japanese diary detailing a marooned soldier's account during World War II, a book that he knows he must keep from his grandfather at all costs. The narrative contained in this secret book unfolds throughout the course of the novel as readers meet Lance Corporal Isamu Oshiro of the Imperial Japanese Army through his own words and learn how his story ended up in the hands of Evan's father. This work is at its best when it is mired in death-seen in Oshiro's self-appointed job as island undertaker, as well as in Griff's stoic refusal to discuss his son's death-and Wynne-Jones is spot-on in his writing on grief, especially from Evan's point of view. The book-within-a-book plot is less successful, as Oshiro's account is a bit lengthy, and the suspense of Griff's involvement ends quickly and conveniently, without much satisfaction for readers. However, the high points of this tale make it worth a first purchase. VERDICT Offering a unique take on the World War II period, this intergenerational tale is an excellent addition to most YA collections.-Susannah Goldstein, Convent of the Sacred Heart, New York City

Copyright 2015 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

Starred review from September 1, 2015
After the shock of his father's sudden death and the arrival of a grandfather he was taught to hate but never met, Evan must unravel a family mystery. His father, Clifford, had been reading a peculiar, leather-bound memoir of a Japanese soldier who was marooned on an island during World War II. An accompanying letter suggests that it's somehow connected to Evan's grandfather Griff, a military man with "steel in [his] backbone." Evan knows that his father never got along with Griff, whose very presence irritates Evan as well, especially when he calls him "soldier." Not wanting to reveal anything to Griff, Evan starts to read Isamu Oshiro's memoir and finds himself mesmerized by the haunting, sad journal addressed to Isamu's fiancee. This book within a book, with its monsters, ghost children, and mysterious glimpses of the future, is as tightly written as Evan's modern-day story. Evan's resistance to his grandfather, colored by his father's poor relationship with him, slowly adjusts the deeper he gets into Isamu's memoir. Dual stories of strength and resilience illuminate the effects that war has on individuals and on father-son relationships, effects that stretch in unexpected ways across generations as Evan and Griff make their ways toward a truce. An accomplished wordsmith, Wynne-Jones achieves an extraordinary feat: he illuminates the hidden depths of personalities and families through a mesmerizing blend of realism and magic. (Fiction. 13-17)

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Starred review from September 15, 2015
Grades 9-12 *Starred Review* Two weeks after finding his father dead with his head resting on a sand-colored book, Evan is still numbed by his loss when three things happen: He receives a puzzling phone call about the book. He begins the strange journey of reading it. And Griff, the grandfather he has never met, arrives unexpectedly early to help settle his father's affairs and take measure of his estranged son's son. Reading the mysterious book in secret, Evan finds the interwoven first-person accounts of two soldiers, one Japanese, the other American, stranded on a small Pacific island during WWII and encountering monsters, ghostly children, eaters of the dead, as well as experiencing pain, privation, and loss. In this well-structured and beautifully written novel, the historical narrative alternates with chapters of Evan's present-day story, in which he unravels the mystery of Griff's involvement as a young marine with events on the island, and, simultaneously, takes his own measure of his grandfather. Wynne-Jones writes with a sure hand and a willingness to take readers into uncharted territory. The main characters in both time periods are complex and vividly portrayed, while the stories, both supernatural and realistic, quietly take note of nuances that standard narratives overlook. A riveting, remarkable novel by a reliably great Canadian writer.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2015, American Library Association.)