Our Mr. Matsura

This past Sunday I had the privilege of attending a screening of Our Mr. Matsura, the latest documentary from my friend and filmmaker extraordinaire Beth Harrington at the Kiggins Theatre in beautiful downtown Vancouver, Washington.

Readers of this blog may remember a little over two years ago when I was a production assistant on Beth's set during a three-day shoot in Seattle, getting a crash course in filmmaking prior to starting production on Hold My Beer. It was really cool to see the finished product, which was both amazing and inspirational. To recap: it's about a photographer named Frank Matsura who traveled from his native Japan to Washington state in the early 1900s, making friends, touching lives, and uniting communities along the way. If you're a fan of historical documentaries and/or just great human interest stories, I highly recommend trying to track it down if it comes to a festival or screening near you!

Give More 24!

After a couple of years, Give More 24! is back to its previous form and time here in September. If you forgot what Give More 24! is, it's 24 hours in which you can make a positive difference in the world by donating to any one of the awesome nonprofit organizations based in the Southwest Washington area. "Sounds great," you say, "but which organization should I donate to?" Well, each organization is definitely worthy of your support, but allow me to make a suggestion: Autism Empowerment.

Why, you ask? Well, because not only are we dedicated to improving the quality of life for people and families in the autism and neurodivergent communities both locally and worldwide via our various programs (like the Neurodivergent Creators Collective), support groups, events, resources, and more, but also because we promote a global culture of acceptance for people of all abilities.

If that sounds good to you, then simply go this link and make a donation. Even just the minimum of $5 will be greatly appreciated. All donations are 100% tax-deductible, and best of all, giving feels good! I know this first-hand, because I donate to Autism Empowerment (on an ongoing basis) one dollar for every Joel Suzuki book that is sold.

Thank you! Mahalo! Arigatou Gozaimasu! Gracias!

Rock & Brews For Suicide Prevention

This Saturday, my band Second Player Score (yes, we are sometimes a band) and our friends Old Cross will be playing a benefit show for the Oregon chapter of the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention!

(The flyer says the show includes special guest Animation Eddie, but unfortunately he had to cancel. You should still check out his awesome stop motion animation on his YouTube channel.)

It will be from 6pm-9pm at Loowit Brewing Company's downtown Vancouver, WA location at 507 Columbia Street. September is National Suicide Prevention Month, so come and enjoy cold beer and hot punk rock tunes while supporting a great cause.

Hope to see you there!

I Am Now On TikTok (Gasp!)

Nearly three weeks ago, I took the bold step of finally setting up a TikTok account!

Some backstory: Andrew York, the star of Hold My Beer, had recommended that I get on TikTok because of a trend known as "BookTok," where authors post videos talking about their books and their personal writing journeys. Apparently, this trend had - and is helping - some authors gain new readers, which is something that the Joel Suzuki series could sure use. 

But while I appreciated his suggestion, I didn't do it at first, for two main reasons: (1) I had an iPhone 6, which, because of its inability to update its operating system, had a hard time running apps and was only good for texts and phone calls and (2) I was terrified of TikTok.

I had never used TikTok before, even just to watch stuff for fun, and the thought of creating an account and posting videos of myself was very intimidating. But then I remembered that I'd actually been doing similar things using other platforms like Facebook and YouTube for years. I also took the momentous step of getting a new phone. At that point, I had no excuse.

So I set up an account and lurked for a while, watching videos from other authors as well as from different kinds of creators, and then, once I got my courage worked up, I took the plunge. And honestly, it's been going pretty well so far! I've been trying to do at least one post a day, and I've been focused on telling the story of how the Joel Suzuki series got started, how it evolved, and where it stands today.

If you'd like to follow along, you can find me at: www.tiktok.com/@brian.tashima.author

Moral of the story: face your fears!

Story Structure Breakdown: KPop Demon Hunters

Yes, I am a fan of the recent hit movie KPop Demon Hunters (Netflix's most-watched movie of all time). Partly because it encompasses multiple elements that I support, including Asian representation, musical magic (or is it magical music?), and the fact that it is a new, original work of IP (intellectual property).

But also because I am 15 years old at heart.

So, after watching it once, I decided to watch it again - yes, I know, I'm waaaay behind those of you who are on your 500th viewing - but this time, I wanted to break down and analyze its story structure to see why it's so effective.

(Note: the folks at Save the Cat beat me to this by one week. Check out their analysis here.)

As I've mentioned in this previous post, I mainly used the books Plot & Structure by James Scott Bell and Save the Cat! by Blake Snyder (highly recommended for aspiring authors and screenwriters) as my story structure reference guides for the Joel Suzuki series. So, applying their formulae to KPop Demon Hunters, this is what I came up with, after the jump (warning: spoilers):

Book Coaching Business

I'm proud to announce that I've started a book coaching business!

My goal is to help aspiring authors (especially those who write from or about marginalized or neurodivergent perspectives) share their stories with the world, drawing on my experience as an author and an instructor for Autism Empowerment's Neurodivergent Creators Collective. My specialties include:

- Science Fiction

- Fantasy

- Action-Adventure

- Middle Grade

- Young Adult

- Autistic and Asian American representation

- Independent publishing

- First-time authors

- Authors who are starting later in life

(Basically, everything I learned from writing and publishing the Joel Suzuki series).

If you're interested in learning more, email me at brian.tashima42@gmail.com!

Anime Roundup

It's time for another Anime Roundup!

(Warning: major spoilers to follow)

The Apothecary Diaries

Set in an alternate-reality version of 15th-ish-century China, this one follows a young girl who is kidnapped and sold to the Imperial Palace as a servant, where she proceeds to prove herself smarter than everyone else there (she was raised by an adoptive father who used to be a doctor, and apparently he's passed all of his knowledge and then some on to her). Because of this, she's quickly promoted from servant to a job that seems to informally combine the tasks of apothecary (kind of like a pharmacist), food taster, forensic pathologist, and private detective, and she goes about solving crimes and mysteries in a somewhat Scooby-Doo-meets-Wednesday Addams-like manner. Also, between you and me, I swear she presents as autistic; she appears to have difficulty with social interaction and expressing emotions, and she has a special interest in herbs and poison that borders on obsession. This was a fun show that for some reason gave me Legend-of-Korra-without-the-bending vibes, probably because of the animation style, music, and Asian-inspired setting.

Oshi no Ko

Okay, this one was totally not what I expected. I thought it was going to be a light and breezy story about a J-pop idol group as they rose through the music business from relative unknowns performing in divey live houses to huge stars selling out the Tokyo Dome.* As it turned out, it was sort of about that, but then there was also a reincarnation storyline (a subgenre of anime in itself) and a Madoka Magica-level (or Game of Thrones if you're not familiar with Madoka Magica, although you really should be) shocker at the end of the feature-length premiere episode. All subsequent episodes after that, even during moments that actually were kind of light and breezy, carried a dark and sinister undertone that kept me on edge the whole time. So yes, even though it wasn't what I expected, I really enjoyed this one (probably even more than if it was what I expected). There's also a live-action adaptation that I watched immediately after and is, despite some pretty major changes, equally delightful (and awesomely meta - the part where the characters were obviously mocking their own show was incredible and hilarious).

* although I suppose the somewhat edgy opening theme song, which I had been hearing for a while before I ever watched the show, should have given me some clues about the true vibe of the show

Witch Watch

A teenage witch (no, not Sabrina) starts living together with her childhood friend, a teenage ikemen (hot guy)-looking ogre whose ancestral duty is to protect her from harm. As you might expect, this premise lends itself to light and breezy rom-com territory, which is where the show lives most of the time, but every so often it veers off into serious, dramatic areas before course-correcting. At one point (episode 14, to be exact - see, I'm taking notes!) it even goes off the rails altogether, as it begins as a completely different anime called "Uron Mirage" (complete with its own theme song and opening credits) that made me wonder if I had clicked on the wrong thumbnail in Netflix until I remembered that "Uron Mirage" is an in-world show that the Witch Watch characters are, um, watching. Speaking of Netflix, they are doing the slow-drip, one-episode-per-week thing with this one, so I think I have about 4-ish? episodes left to go - lots of time for the show to do more weird stuff.

Tonbo!

A light-hearted, feel-good show (why does it seem like all movies and shows about golf have a lighter tone? Why not a dark, dystopian tale about people killing zombies with 5-irons? Hmm, I may be on to something here...) about a washed-up pro golfer who discovers a young prodigy and takes her under his wing. I'm a golf fan, even though I haven't picked up a club in what feels like forever, so I enjoyed this one. It has a similar premise to the Apple TV+ series Stick, which I watched concurrently (or maybe I should say Stick has a similar premise to this show, since the manga that it's based on started back in 2014). I also recently watched Happy Gilmore 2, so my life has been kind of full of golf-related stories lately. A sign from the universe that I should dust off my clubs? Eh, probably not.

My Deer Friend Nokotan

This was another one that wasn't what I had expected. Ostensibly, it's about an overachieving high school girl with a hidden delinquent past who meets a hybrid deer-girl (which reminded me of the Netflix show Sweet Tooth) who threatens to reveal her secret unless she starts and runs an after-school "Deer Club." And I guess it is sort of that, but then it veers off into all kinds of strange directions, sometimes within the span of the same episode (or even part of an episode). This is not to say I didn't enjoy it; I actually found it quite entertaining, especially after I had moved it to my evening watch slot (which takes place after I've had a couple of beers). It was very meta, which I always appreciate, and all the constant deer-related references brought back memories of the time I went to Japan for a college study tour and was mobbed by a herd of deer in Nara Park. Good times!