Emily Itami’s book “Kakigori Summer” centers around three “haafu,” or half-Japanese, sisters who return to their childhood home on the coast of Japan when one of them, a Japanese pop star, becomes embroiled in a scandal.
Itami, like the sisters in her novel, is half Japanese, half British. She grew up in Tokyo and now lives in London.
“I can’t stop thinking about Japan,” Itami said. “The thing that I know is that I miss it the way that I miss a person, and I can’t really imagine missing anything else in that way.
10 questions with Emily Itami
Can you share your thoughts on Japan?
“I think that in a way, when you move away from a place, it’s easy to idealize it, and I am aware that that might to some degree be what I’ve done with Japan.
“I really love to write about it because I want to be back there, I suppose, and write myself back into it. And it just kind of amazes me, Japan as a culture. I feel like it’s so extreme in so many ways, the way that it kind of is encourages you to keep your feelings under control, and everything has to be quite contained. It was interesting to think about feelings within that context.”
We feel that tension between the sisters: pop star Ai, Rei, and Kiki and their great great grandmother. She can be very stern and seem unkind.
“She’s kind of the ultimate Japanese grandmother of a certain type. I’ve definitely had conversations with people where they say that they recognize her. [She’s] super critical, very opinionated, and she really wants to whip the new generation into line. And the new generation are not really having it because all of her old rules are unreasonable to them.”
Kiki, one of the sisters, is a single mom of a little boy who is a quarter Japanese. He’s got blond hair, speaks fluent Japanese and there’s concern about how he might fit in. Can you talk a bit about being biracial?
“I grew up in Japan, so I suppose I was just always aware of being an outsider. I was very happy. I had a really wonderful childhood. But I was also really aware that, for example, in my piano lessons where I was the only kid who wasn’t fully Japanese, there would be people who would say behind their hands, ‘she’s gaijin,’ ‘she’s a foreigner,’ and stuff. And I think I just got used to living my life like that.
“I think it was only afterwards, and maybe when I came to live in London where it’s so diverse, that I started to look at my life [in Japan] sort of from the outside and notice how homogeneous I guess it had been and how much of an outsider I’d always felt.
“And I was kind of interested in the fact that if you’re biracial, and maybe in particular in Japan where it is quite difficult to fit in and it’s a relatively closed society, you have the great privilege of coming from two cultures, but maybe also you kind of feel like you don’t fit into either of them.”
You make casual references to things in Japanese sometimes, for example, the sisters passed a group of school children with their ‘randoseru’?
“It’s this backpack that all Japanese school children have. It’s massive. The inside of it is often almost kind of metal, so that not only can it hold absolutely everything, but apparently you can even hold it over your head so it would act as a shield in an earthquake or something like that.”
I looked up Japanese words a lot, and that gave me these incredible images. For example, a character would explain that the Japanese word for fireworks is ‘hanabi’ or ‘flower fire.’ You make me feel it.
“Oh, I totally wanted the reader to feel it. I mean, I kind of think maybe the way that I feel about Japan and everything I grew up with is a bit extra … I love it so much.”
Even though there were times when you might not have been accepted fully by Japanese people?
“Yeah, I know sometimes I think it’s like Stockholm syndrome … I am aware that I probably do idealize it … I suppose because I have the privilege of not being in it all the time, I have the privilege of being able to love all of its wonderful aspects. And when I lived there, there were definitely things that hugely did bother me that I found really difficult.”
Can you talk about Tokyo in particular?
“I think that in recent years, tourism to Tokyo and travel to Japan has just become so much, it’s exploded. But when I first moved back to London, I hardly spoke to anyone who’d ever even been there. It was like I was describing some kind of alien place that no one knew what I was talking about.
“So, [Tokyo] is such a contradiction because I know that when I lived there, there are a lot of things about it that make you feel very restricted. It’s quite conservative, actually. But on the other hand, within that, it’s got so much unbelievable freedom and potential and, you know, it’s the ultimate 24-hour city. There’s nothing that you can’t do when you’re there. There are so many independent businesses and people have these crazy ideas and they carry them out.
“And one of the things that I love the most is that everyone is so determined to do everything that they do to the highest of standards, and that’s exactly the thing that makes you feel kind of stressed and restricted when you’re there as a worker, but also, if you’re living in it or visiting it, then it’s extraordinary.”
Two of your characters go dangerously over the edge. The girl’s mom has some sort of breakdown. The youngest sister is a pop superstar, but lives in what sounds like indentured slavery in this pop group owned by a record label. Is that a reaction to some of the restrictions for women in particular?
“Yes, I definitely think so. Of course, things are changing, but yeah, it’s still very much a kind of a patriarchal society. There’s still quite a lot of traditional gender roles, and I think that the pressure to conform to societal norms and also to be able to contain yourself is extraordinarily high. I think that, generally speaking, the kind of attitude towards mental health is that you can control it through sheer force of will. And if you’re not able to do that, then it’s probably best undiscussed. I mean, that’s a slightly unnuanced view, but overall as a feeling that that definitely is a kind of societal view.
“So, of course, when things do become too difficult, they kind of tend to spiral because there’s nowhere to turn. And you know, Japan has historically one of the highest suicide rates in the world. So, with this society that I love so much, there are massive problems and it’s so difficult to live within it because of the standards and everything being so high.”
Let’s go back to the biracial theme for a second. At one point Rei is talking about Hikaru, Kiki’s son, who can speak Japanese. She compares him to one of those dogs that’s been brought up by a goose and gets a terrible shock when it catches sight of its reflection in a puddle. Can you talk more about that sense that you have an image of yourself in your head, and may be shocked to see that you are not.
“That is literally exactly what it is! It is surprising. I realized that whichever country I’m in, whether I’m in Japan or I’m in England, I tend to identify myself as being from that place, which is true, but also I forget that I’m not completely. So I am surprised.
“I went to a very diverse school in London and then when I went to university, and it was a slightly less diverse crowd, and I do remember literally having that that feeling of seeing photographs and just being surprised, being confused about who that person could be, and then realizing it was myself. So it always surprised me.
“And I’m aware that wherever I go, I guess, particularly in Japan, people are always pointing out, ‘Well, you’re not from here.’ And sometimes when I talk, or me and my sister when we’re talking, people will answer us in English even though we’re speaking to them in perfect Japanese, and I’ve realized from talking to some other Haafu people that I’ve met, that that that’s quite a common experience.”
Turns out you are a puppy and not a goose.
“Yes, exactly.”
Book excerpt: ‘Kakigori Summer’
By Emily Itami
When Kiki calls, with her usual impeccable timing, the ambient airport noises on my headphones are turned up full blast, and I only answer the phone in order to silence it. My boss, Llewellyn, has just told me I have three hours to put together a presentation that requires at least a week of prep. Llewellyn has spent our entire working relationship making wrong assumptions about me based on my Asian face, and I have never done anything to correct him. I definitely do not have time for a heart-to-heart with my sister.
Kiki starts talking with no preamble, but her words are lost, because the paralegal in the office opposite has just taken a personal call, and when I remove my headphones all I can hear is her announcing to somebody that Bloody Vagina has gone and done it again. From what I’ve learnt from her calls, Vagina is her father’s newest wife. Meanwhile, Hikaru is talking over Kiki at her end, an insistent and rhythmic ‘MaMA, MaMA, MaMA’ that I don’t understand how Kiki can tune out. I have no idea why she can’t text me like a normal person. I go to close the door, and manage to drop the phone so it skitters across the corridor.
‘Turn on the news.’ The dictum floats up from the floor, the voice of a disembodied oracle.
I grab the phone before anyone hears anything else they don’t need to.
‘What do you mean turn on the news?’ I hiss, crouched down in front of one of the enormous flower arrangements that bloom incongruously across the office. ‘I live in London; I don’t have terrestrial television.’ Japan has twelve channels, and getting access to internet TV is like trying to break into the Pentagon. I think it’s a form of mind control.
‘Well, go to the digital news outlet of your choice, then.’
‘I have no digital news outlet of choice. The choice is liars or doomsayers so I’ve stopped paying attention. What is it?’
‘It’s Ai,’ Kiki says, and my stomach drops. I should have paid closer attention to the messages. ‘She’s become a national disgrace and lost her job.’ I’ve always admired that in Kiki – her ability to make all pieces of information sound equally neutral and matter-of-fact. I think the set lunch comes with a side salad. I think the person you were hoping to see is already dead. Sweet relief washes over me, followed quickly by irritation that my workday is being interrupted for someone who is still alive.
‘Don’t be over-dramatic.’
‘I’m not being over-dramatic. If you turned on the news you’d see.’
‘For f***’* sake, Kiki.’ I look up to see one of the banking interns walking past, clutching coffees. ‘Unless she’s orchestrated a terrorist attack or murdered the emperor, the BBC is not going to be covering a story about a pop talent from Tokyo.’ I get up to return to my office.
‘She’s not a talent, Rei, she’s an idol. She’s everywhere online. There are videos of them hanging around outside a brothel.’
‘A brothel? Who?’
‘Her and Ichiro,’ Kiki says. ‘Well, maybe not an actual brothel.’
‘Who the hell is Ichiro?’
‘Don’t you know anything?’
‘Nothing current, as we’ve already established.’ I sit back down at my desk.
It turns out our little sister, to the pearl-clutching horror of the Japanese public, has been caught doing the walk of shame with a married man. Not just any married man, but Suzu Ichiro, the president of Kansas Records, the biggest record label in the country, and my sister’s possibly erstwhile employer.
‘Is he even hot?’ I ask, like it matters.
‘No, obviously not – Hikaru, if you keep doing that, you’re going to shut your fingers in the drawer, and it will hurt – I mean, not that bad, for a suit. I guess the power might be attractive? He has quite nice eyes—’
‘It was kind of a rhetorical question.’
Hikaru lets out a blood-curdling howl.
‘It’s OK, Hikaru, come here,’ my sister says, the tone of her voice changing not one iota. ‘Oh dear, does it hurt?’ I hear kisses, crooning noises that are almost obliterated by his fireengine wails.
‘I have to go, Rei,’ Kiki calls over the noise. ‘Google it!’
Maybe it’s no bad thing that at that moment, Llewellyn sticks his head into the office and says that, actually, the client report needs to be ready in one hour, not three, and we’re presenting to the senior managers after lunch. I could swear he smirks as he says it. As he closes the door, my watch, an activity tracker that is never satisfied, orders me to ‘Move!’ with a smiley face.
Excerpted from the book “Kakigori Summer,” provided courtesy of Mariner Books, an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers. Copyright © 2025 by Emily Itami. Reprinted by permission.
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Emiko Tamagawa produced and edited this interview for broadcast with Todd Mundt. Tamagawa also produced it for the web.
This article was originally published on WBUR.org.
Copyright 2025 WBUR