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Q. Have you written any previous books?
A. No, actually, this is my very first book. It’s been an overwhelming chore to write this 400-page memoir.
Q. How long did it take to write it?
A. This has been a lifetime kind of thing. At 40, I took a writing class, and the teacher said, “This is an important book. I will help you write it.” At that time, it was in the form of a diary. But if I had written it then, it would have been half-baked, and probably not all that interesting. When I hit 60, that was kind of a turning point in my life. I thought, I wonder if I am going in the right direction in life, and took all these career and aptitude tests and found out I’m pretty much average on everything. And I thought, maybe I should write this book, but all of a sudden, I’m 80, and I think, gosh, time is running short! But I got a whole lot wiser, being 80. So I did a very wise thing, I married Mal Nunneley, who encouraged me to write this book.
Q. And then?
A. Every morning I would go to the donut shop and I would write an hour or two hours. Every morning I did that. Mal sent me out to write. It’s probably one reason why I did get this finished. And then, what a sense of relief! But the writing was easy compared to what goes on afterwards. [Kiyo submitted queries to a list of publishers, all of which turned down Dandelion Through the Crack.]
Q. Oh? Then how did Dandelion get to publication?
A. Ken Umbach has been my navigator over these treacherous waters of publishing. In all that, he’s kept me on track, and then led me on to Barry Schoenborn, of Willow Valley Press. I feel very fortunate to have these two men helping me bring Dandelion to print. So here I am.
Q. What other influences helped in the process?
A. You’re not going to believe this, but Danielle Steel had a role. At the donut shop, the owner said, “Kiyo, is this true, what she writes about, in Silent Honor?” I had never read any of Danielle Steel’s books, but the shop owner asked me, “About these camps, did that really happen?” And I thought to myself, even adults are questioning this. So I bought the book and read it. I was really impressed that she wrote her whole book on this internment experience. The historical facts were right on target, exactly what happened during 1942. And another thing — we [Kiyo and her associates in the Nisei VFW chapter] do a lot of speaking to schools, over twenty years now. Some years we have had as many as 80 requests during the school year. It’s getting harder (I’ll be 84 next week) to speak to young students at eight in the morning. So that’s another thing. I hope this book fills the gaps for the students. An award a few years back from the California Writers Club, for what is now the second chapter of Dandelion, also helped to spur me on. I was so encouraged when they gave me first place in the nonfiction category.
Q. What about the haiku that open each chapter?
A. I found those poems, written in Japanese in my father’s spiral notebooks, after he died. They have been a treasure to me. So I picked a haiku to begin each chapter. Each is in transliterated Japanese with an English translation.
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Kiyo in her garden.
Kiyo holding bowl.
Kiyo Sato with cabinet made in Poston internment camp by her father,Shinji Sato, from scavenged materials, using tools smuggled in. She holds
bowl made of walnut wood by a friend of the family and given to the Satos after their return to Sacramento.
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