Secret Harvests: A Hidden Story of Separation, by David Mas Masumoto HARDBACK

Red Hen Press

Secret HarvestsA Hidden Story of Separation, Silence, Shame, and the Resilience of a Family Farm\nAuthor(s): David Mas Masumoto, Patricia Miye Wakida\nFormat: Hardback\nPublisher: Red Hen Press, United States\nImprint: Red Hen Press\nISBN-13: 9781636280776, 978-1636280776\nSynopsis\nI discover a \""lost\"" aunt, separated from our\nfamily due to racism and discrimination against the disabled. She had a mental\ndisability due to childhood meningitis. She was taken away in 1942 when all\nJapanese Americans were considered the enemy and imprisoned. She then became a\n\""ward\"" of the state. We believed she had died, but 70 years later\nfound her alive and living a few miles from our family farm. How did she survive?\nWhy was she kept hidden? How did both shame and resilience empower my family to\nforge forward in a land that did not want them? I am haunted and driven to\nexplore my identity and the meaning of familyespecially as farmers tied to the\nland. I uncover family secrets that bind.