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📁 RETURN TO FIRST IMPRESSIONS📁RETURN TO CHA REVIEW OF BOOKS AND FILMS Quan Manh Ha and Cab Tran (editors), The Colors of April: Fiction on the Vietnam War’s Legacy 50 Years Later, Three Room Press, 2025. 306 pgs. The Colors of…
![[FIRST IMPRESSIONS] “An Empathetic Communion with the Past—𝑇ℎ𝑒 𝐶𝑜𝑙𝑜𝑟𝑠 𝑜𝑓 𝐴𝑝𝑟𝑖𝑙: 𝐹𝑖𝑐𝑡𝑖𝑜𝑛 𝑜𝑛 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑉𝑖𝑒𝑡𝑛𝑎𝑚 𝑊𝑎𝑟’𝑠 𝐿𝑒𝑔𝑎𝑐𝑦 50 𝑌𝑒𝑎𝑟𝑠 𝐿𝑎𝑡𝑒𝑟” by Aaron Gerhart](https://chajournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/03/the-colors-of-april-fiction-on-the-vietnam-wars-legacy-50-years-later--1.jpg?w=1000)
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📁 RETURN TO FIRST IMPRESSIONS📁 RETURN TO CHA REVIEW OF BOOKS AND FILMS Hideko Abe, Queer Japanese: Gender and Sexual Identities through Linguistic Practices, Palgrave Macmillan, 2010. 199 pgs. Queer Japanese: Gender and Sexual Identities through Linguistic Practices offers readers a glimpse…
![[REVIEW] “Speaking in Queer Tongues: Language, Identity, and Everyday Resistance in Hideko Abe’s 𝑄𝑢𝑒𝑒𝑟 𝐽𝑎𝑝𝑎𝑛𝑒𝑠𝑒” by Jane McBride](https://chajournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/03/queer-japanese-gender-and-sexual-identities-through-linguist-practices-1.jpg?w=827)
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📁 RETURN TO FIRST IMPRESSIONS📁 RETURN TO CHA REVIEW OF BOOKS AND FILMS Naomi Kawase, True Mothers, 2020. 140 min. Are human faces a resource? Are they a commodity? Can they be picked like grapes and harvested like grain? Can they be…
![[FIRST IMPRESSIONS] “The Face Of Integrity In Naomi Kawase’s 𝑇𝑟𝑢𝑒 𝑀𝑜𝑡ℎ𝑒𝑟𝑠” by Anders Kølle](https://chajournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/03/true-mothers.jpg?w=708)
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Japanese cinema has long been a vanguard of distinctive stylistic choices, particularly in the realm of horror. J-horror eschews gratuitous special effects in favour of an atmospheric approach that meticulously cultivates suspense, delivering an experience that is profoundly unsettling. Ringu…
![[EXCLUSIVE] “Before J-Horror: The Paranormal in Ancient Japanese Writing” by Tushi Gogoi](https://chajournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/03/a-traditional-japanese-emaki-scroll-scene-depicting-a-22hyakkiyagyo22-.png?w=1024)
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茶 FIRST IMPRESSIONS 茶 REVIEW OF BOOKS & FILMS [REVIEW] “The Making of An Unlikely Maritime Superpower—Jack Weatherford’s Emperor of the Seas: Kublai Khan and the Making of China” by Ryan Ho Kilpatrick Jack Weatherford, Emperor of the Seas: Kublai…
![[REVIEW] “The Making of An Unlikely Maritime Superpower—Jack Weatherford’s 𝐸𝑚𝑝𝑒𝑟𝑜𝑟 𝑜𝑓 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑆𝑒𝑎𝑠: 𝐾𝑢𝑏𝑙𝑎𝑖 𝐾ℎ𝑎𝑛 𝑎𝑛𝑑 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑀𝑎𝑘𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑜𝑓 𝐶ℎ𝑖𝑛𝑎” by Ryan Ho Kilpatrick](https://chajournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/03/emperor-of-the-seas-kublai-khan-and-the-making-of-china-1.jpg?w=963)
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茶 FIRST IMPRESSIONS 茶 REVIEW OF BOOKS & FILMS [REVIEW] “Uncovering the Truths of the Toleration-Regulation Regime—Park Jeong-mi’s The State’s Sexuality: Prostitution and Postcolonial Nation Building in South Korea” by Jack Greenberg Park Jeong-mi, The State’s Sexuality: Prostitution and Postcolonial…
![[REVIEW] “Uncovering the Truths of the Toleration-Regulation Regime—Park Jeong-mi’s 𝑇ℎ𝑒 𝑆𝑡𝑎𝑡𝑒’𝑠 𝑆𝑒𝑥𝑢𝑎𝑙𝑖𝑡𝑦: 𝑃𝑟𝑜𝑠𝑡𝑖𝑡𝑢𝑡𝑖𝑜𝑛 𝑎𝑛𝑑 𝑃𝑜𝑠𝑡𝑐𝑜𝑙𝑜𝑛𝑖𝑎𝑙 𝑁𝑎𝑡𝑖𝑜𝑛 𝐵𝑢𝑖𝑙𝑑𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑖𝑛 𝑆𝑜𝑢𝑡ℎ 𝐾𝑜𝑟𝑒𝑎” by Jack Greenberg](https://chajournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/03/https-www.ucpress.edubooksthe-states-sexualitypaper-1.jpg?w=1000)
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◉ I Made Sure It Had Nothing Whatsoever To Do With Hong Kong: A Confession◉ The Ballad of Billy Lopez: An Excerpt Stewart McKay, The Ballad of Billy Lopez, Proverse Publishing, 2024. 208 pgs. So I’m walking down the middle of the…
![[FEATURE] “𝑇ℎ𝑒 𝐵𝑎𝑙𝑙𝑎𝑑 𝑜𝑓 𝐵𝑖𝑙𝑙𝑦 𝐿𝑜𝑝𝑒𝑧: An Excerpt” by Stewart McKay](https://chajournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/03/stewart-mckay.jpg?w=971)
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◉ I Made Sure It Had Nothing Whatsoever To Do With Hong Kong: A Confession◉ The Ballad of Billy Lopez: An Excerpt Stewart McKay, The Ballad of Billy Lopez, Proverse Publishing, 2024. 208 pgs. You have lived in Hong Kong…
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📁 RETURN TO FIRST IMPRESSIONS📁 RETURN TO CHA REVIEW OF BOOKS AND FILMS Matthew Wong Foreman, Sunset at Lion Rock, Proverse Press, 2024. 288 pgs. ………I’ve no strength left to stop the contradiction………My heart is tired and my eyes blurry you know………—Leslie…
![[REVIEW] “Keep the Aspidistra Flying, Among Many, Many Other Things: Matthew Wong Foreman’s 𝑆𝑢𝑛𝑠𝑒𝑡 𝑎𝑡 𝐿𝑖𝑜𝑛 𝑅𝑜𝑐𝑘” by Jason S Polley](https://chajournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/03/matthew-wong-foreman-sunset-at-lion-rock-1.jpg?w=962)
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📁 RETURN TO FIRST IMPRESSIONS📁 RETURN TO CHA REVIEW OF BOOKS AND FILMS Bong Joon-ho (director), Mickey 17, 2025. 137 min. Header image © bartos. Bong Joon-ho’s Mickey 17 is at once an existential tragedy and a darkly comic spectacle—a sci-fi epic…
![[REVIEW] “Dying for a Living: Bong Joon-ho’s 𝑀𝑖𝑐𝑘𝑒𝑦 17 and the Horror of Being Replaceable” by Ananya Singh](https://chajournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/03/c2a9marclafon-mickey17-rectangle.jpg?w=1024)
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