Wat Kept Playing

March 15, 2024
Grades K-3 Growing up in Utah, Wataru Misaka sometimes faced discrimination as the son of Japanese immigrants, but when he played basketball in his neighborhood, no one cared about his parents' origins. For years, Wat kept playing ball with his friends and practicing on his own. After the attack on Pearl Harbor, many Americans' views shifted. While Wat's family was not incarcerated, they encountered prejudice. When Wat left home to study engineering at the University of Utah, he joined the basketball team and excelled despite his small stature. After being drafted and sent to Japan during its occupation by U.S. forces, he returned home and, in 1947, became the first person of color to play professional basketball in the BAA (a precursor to the NBA). Huey's convincing narrative portrays Misaka as a gifted player who worked hard to perfect his skills and quietly earned the respect of fans as well as his teammates. Kang's illustrations are notable for their strong structural quality and sometimes haunting tonal effects. A worthwhile picture-book biography of a little-known Japanese American.

COPYRIGHT(2024) Booklist, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

Starred review from July 12, 2024

PreS-Gr 3-Young basketball enthusiasts today may not connect the history of the game to Japan or World War II. A Japanese American man named Wat Misaka served in WWII and broke the color line of what would become the National Basketball Association (NBA). Misaka, the son of immigrant parents from Japan, was born in America and loved being Japanese and American. Sadly, he often did not feel America loved him back. The one place where he knew he belonged was the basketball court. When, as the result of the U.S.'s conflict with Japan, Japanese were put in internment camps, Misaka could not make sense of what was going on around him. Despite racism on and off the court, he kept doing the one thing he knew and understood-playing basketball. Like Cheryl Kim's recent Wat Take His Shot: The Life Legacy of Basketball Hero Wataru Misaka, which works for slightly older readers, this title doesn't sentimentalize or play down the overwhelming obstacles Misaka faced-not only racism and returning to the game after serving in the military, but at 5'7," his relatively small stature. Huey and Kang have done an outstanding job of bringing Misaka's story to life, including his heroic journey to find out where he belonged in this world. VERDICT For slightly younger readers, this is an encouraging and enlightening story long overdue; both this book and Kim's need to be on every shelf.-Laura Ellis

Copyright 2024 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.