Almost American Girl

Nonfiction | Graphic Memoir | YA | Published in 2020

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Summary

Background

Chapter Summaries & Analyses

Chapters 1-4

Chapters 5-8

Chapters 9-11

Chapter 12-Epilogue

Key Figures

Themes

Symbols & Motifs

Important Quotes

Essay Topics

Symbols & Motifs

Queen’s Quest & Comics

Comics in general are a recurring motif that help develop the theme of The Power of Stories in Shaping Identity. The comic Queen’s Quest is a fictional comic loosely based on Robin’s favorite real-life Korean comics. Robin looks to its characters, setting, and plots of this comic as symbolism for her own life.

Part of the reason Robin feels isolated in America is because she is isolated from her comics. Without them, she tries to use the conventions of the comic genre to make sense of her new identity in America. When she is told she can choose an American name, Robin thinks, “things like this only happened in movie and comic books, and now it was happening to me” (52). An illustration shows Robin flying, equipped in a superhero suit with a “?” on the front. She sees adopting a new name as adopting an alternate identity, like how a superhero has their ordinary and their super persona.

Queen’s Quest is a particularly important comic that symbolizes how Robin feels in America: it is about a princess “cursed and cast out of her kingdom by an evil witch. She had to find a way to break the curse and return to her homeland” (63). On Pages 78-79, Robin illustrates herself being cast out of her previous life and falling to the ground in a “strange and hostile land” (79) made up of thorns, barren trees, and grey skies. She has nightmares about running away from home and returning to Korea, like how Princess Eshika strives to return to her homeland.

The first solace Robin feels in Alabama is when her mother’s old hair salon assistant Miss Jung sends her a box full of comics, including the newest issues of Queen’s Quest. Having her comics helps her feel more secure in her new identity. Her room finally feels like her own and she relishes reading in Korean. On Pages 106-07, Robin daydreams about the Queen’s Quest characters welcoming her back into the comic world, asking her where she has been and saying they missed her. Being reunited gives Robin the strength to establish a new identity as an immigrant. She tells them, “I can do anything as long as you guys are with me,” and they promise her that, “As long as you need us, we’ll always be with you” (107). Though they are fictional characters, they serve a powerful role in Robin’s life and identity.

Barry the Dog

Barry is the dog owned by Robin’s step-uncle, step-aunt, and stepcousins. They keep Barry chained up outside, ignore him, and never let him in the house. Barry symbolizes how Robin sees her own place in the family and in American society more widely.

Before she knows she is relocating permanently, Robin is left alone all day while her stepfamily goes to work and school and her mother sees if she will marry Mr. Kim and stay with him. She wakes up every day and walks around an empty house, thinking, “I guess I’m alone again” (20). The family also leave Barry alone all day, tied up outside. Robin tells Barry, “you and I are like kindred spirits, lonely and bored out of our minds” (22). Barry is less like a pet to the Kims and more like a piece of furniture. Similarly, they operate around Robin as if she is not there. When the cousins hang out in the living room, they “don’t even try to include [her],” turn their backs to her and speak in English (89). Similarly, people ignore her in the lunchroom at school and she sits alone.

While Robin and her mother plan their secret move to Virginia, Barry dies. Once he is gone, the family cries and reflects on how much they loved him and will miss him. Robin thinks about how they “never played with him when he was alive” and how he “probably died of loneliness” (189). Robin is more relieved than sad for Barry. While they bury him, she silently tells him, “Rest in peace, Barry. You’re free now” (189). Robin understands that being ignored and ostracized is its own type of prison.

Barry’s life and death parallel and symbolize Robin’s own experience in her family and society more largely. While Robin hopes Barry finds “peace” in death, she also finds freedom shortly afterward in moving to Virginia.

Alabama and Virginia

After their time in Alabama, Robin and her mother secretly plan to move to Virginia. Alabama symbolizes the parts of American society that make Robin feel trapped, judged, and stymied. In contrast, Virginia symbolizes new beginnings and the parts of American society that make Robin feel like she is beginning to fit in. Robin uses illustrations of places to symbolize how those places make her feel. Page 21 is filled with one large full-page illustration in the background, with two smaller illustrations set against this background image toward the top of the page. On the previous page, Robin wanders alone around the Kims’ house, bored and unable to find food that she likes. On Page 79, one small illustration shows her standing in the Kims’ entryway and the other shows her looking at the bright sun, sweating. The full-page illustration is drawn from a point-of-view a few feet behind Robin. It shows her looking out over her new neighborhood. Cookie-cutter suburban houses line a street, evenly-dotted with identical trees, as far as the eye can see. Beyond that are green hills and an immense blue sky. The monotonous, extensive, empty scenery looms before Robin, who stands apart from it. This depiction of Alabama symbolizes how she sees this “strange and hostile land” (79) of the United States.

The title of the final chapter, “Sweet Home Virginia,” ironically references the country rock song “Sweet Home Alabama” by Lynyrd Skynyrd. Alabama symbolized isolation and ostracization for Robin, whereas Virginia will come to symbolize home and new beginnings. As with her depiction of Alabama, the way Robin illustrates Virginia signifies how she feels about it. Pages 204-05 show her first impressions of Virginia: These pages are bustling, crowded, colorful, and full of small, varied panels. They show her practicing piano in a large apartment, her mother working at a Korean salon, and her attending a comic convention with Jessica. In Virginia, she pursues the things she loves with freedom and without stress. Her new town in Virginia has a large immigrant population, which Huntsville did not. Robin’s ESL class makes her feel “like a mutant teenager from X-Men who had finally found Xavier’s School for Gifted Youngsters” (209). Virginia comes to symbolize a place where she can celebrate her differences rather than be derided for them.