After a bit of a funny reading month in September, I have been getting back into my reading, and have been picking up some of September’s poor, neglected NetGalley reads. I went for this novel first of all, as something relatively easy and attractive. It was a great read, this author’s first book for an adult audience with material and plot handled really confidently and with good technical ability. It was heart-warming and diverse and there was nothing not to love!

Emiko Jean – “Mika in Real Life”

(23 May 2022, NetGalley)

I didn’t think about the future that day. I didn’t think about the Calvins, your new mother and father, how white they were. Who would teach you to be a yellow body in America? I didn’t think about what I might tell you if you came to me and asked, “Why, who are you, who am I?” Of course, I dreamed I might be a part of your life, but in the same way someone wishes upon a star.

The book opens with Mika giving up her newborn daughter for adoption. She’s in the hospital with her best friend Hana – not her mum, not the baby’s father. It’s all quite perfunctory, a whirl, and the baby is gone. Only a few pages later, we get the tantalising information that Mika will be back in that hospital with that same person, sixteen years later, but how and why is held back from us very cleverly for most of the book (I kept thinking I’d guessed, and I was wrong every time).

Mika is Japanese American, born in Japan but moving to Portland as a young child with her job-seeking father and unwilling, frightened and resentful mother. That fear and resentment has translated into perfectionism, shaming and recoiling from Mika’s desire to be an artist, and Mika has a really hard time with her mother, right into the time when Penny reappears, because of course Penny reappears, and threatens to undo all of Mika’s hard work.

Mika and Hana are pleasingly still best friends and in fact, even though there is the family “romance” of mother and daughter reuniting and romance for Mika herself, the primary relationship in the book is between these two loving friends, and they are surrounded by a great friendship group of diverse and interesting people. For example, when Mika’s mum introduces her to a prospective boyfriend – at church, again – he comes out to her and quickly but believably gets absorbed into the friendship group, providing support and care. I loved this aspect of the book so much, as well as the diversity – as well as being of mixed heritage, Hana is an ASL interpreter for rock bands (how cool?) and their other friends have a wide range of heritages naturally, too. There’s a lot about the way Penny’s adoptive parents have clumsily tried to introduce her to Japanese culture, and touching moments when especially Mika’s mum instructs her as grandmothers all over the world do.

The line about living a lie on the front cover is a bit of a misnomer. Without giving the plot away, Mika initially tries to present a perfect life to Penny, ashamed she’s 35, unemployed again, with no partner or home of her own. Her friends help her in this but also then help her to develop her ability to “do Mika”, to be her authentic self, and especially to reconnect with the art practice she lost at college. I love how independent she is in this: she won’t even let the assistant in the art supplies shop get a bottle off a high shelf for her. I also liked that when Penny moves near for the summer, it’s because of her own athletic ability, hard work and talent, rather than just drifting around without purpose. Mika never believes her relationship with Penny and then her dad will last long, and we hope against hope that she’ll prove herself wrong.

There are some very funny set pieces, while the book has a bittersweet feel in general. People’s pomposity is pricked and there’s a hilarious scene with a sculpture exhibition. The story is ultimately inspiring without being sappy, and there is definite difficulty along the way: relationships are drawn beautifully and again, it’s those friendships that really stand out (I can’t remember if a particular friend has read this, but he’ll like it if he hasn’t!). Even when Hana starts going out with a new love, she makes space for Mika while protecting her relationship; not something that always happens in books, or indeed life!

Mika put her car in gear and drove home. To Hana, to a place where Mika always felt perfectly loved. As promised, Hana was waiting, her arms open, and Mike fell into them, finding comfort in her boy shoulder.

Thank you to Penguin/Michael Joseph for selecting me to read this book via NetGalley in return for an honest review. “Mika in Real Life” was published on 8 September 2022 and I heartily recommend it.