Every Peach Is a Story
by David Mas Masumoto and Nikiko Masumoto; illus. by Lauren Tamaki
Primary    Cameron/Abrams    40 pp.
3/25    9781949480290    $18.99
e-book ed.  9798887070735    $17.09

“A peach, like a story, needs time to grow.” Young Midori looks to her grandfather to instruct her about the peaches on their farm. She is impatient for them to ripen, but Jiichan tells her that “we have to wait.” When green, peaches crunch unpleasantly; later, they are yellow but still feel too firm; finally, at summer’s height, they are a deep golden color and smell sweet and “like the rich soil.” Jiichan weaves a story about their family into his teachings, equating green peaches with their Japanese ancestors when they arrived in America (“Things weren’t ready”), then describing how, despite adversity, they put down roots and thrived. Summer passes; Jiichan grows frail and, in winter, dies. Midori visits the cemetery, telling Jiichan that she understands now: “This peach is your story. This peach is our story.” Tamaki’s impressionistic mixed-media illustrations employ a palette that follows the seasons; the art evokes both setting and the close relationship between Midori and Jiichan exquisitely. Notable illustrations include one, in lush golds and greens, of the whole family working the peach harvest; another of bare trees, starkly black against a pale-blue sky, when they “say goodbye to Jiichan.” Coauthor Nikiko Masumoto’s endnote tells more about her family’s California farm, which the book is based on, and discusses in detail experiences alluded to in the story, including racial hostility faced by her immigrant forebears and the WWII incarceration of Japanese Americans.

From the ">May/June 2025 issue of The Horn Book Magazine.