Review - The Color of Earth

The Color of Earth
by Kim Dong Hwa
First Second Books
 

I had been reading about this book in several library type magazines as being well done. And last month I added the three book of this trilogy to the buy list for the library.

The Color of Earth is a coming of age story set around a young woman named Ehwa. She is 10 at the start of the book and lives with her widowed mother who runs the tavern in an rural village. Set in Korea during the early 1900s, this first book in a trilogy is a wonderful story with very pretty artwork. By the end of the book, Ehwa is a young teenager and her interests in boys is growing.

The relationship and discussion between Ehwa and her mother makes up most of the story. As Ehwa asks questions about growing up and she is told about life and relationships, many of the answers involve stories of flowers, insects and the wind. Ehwa notices a young monk in training and equates him with tiger lilies. Another boy, who is the son of the orchard grower, makes an impression on Ehwa, but has to go back to the city for his studies. And throughout the book, Ehwa's mother is loving and supportive of the decisions Ehwa makes concerning her life. The analogies for love and sex are almost poetic and in some sense (from my cynically unromantic point of view) almost unintentionally comical.

The art is very well done. Mostly using line drawings for the characters, occasionally they jump into a Japanese chibi style when appropriate. Also, though most of the background art is sparse, occasionally a realistic drawing of a landscape will be presented to effectively add to the drama of the tale. And once I figured out that Ehwa has a solid top with a patterned skirt and her mother is opposite with a patterned top and a solid skirt, it was much easier to follow the story.

Since the library has a new Young Adult librarian, I'm going to let her decide if these books are going to go into the adult non-fiction area of the young adult graphic novel section. Personally, though the themes are of love and sex, this treatment is very poetic and thoughtful.