Snow Falling On Cedars ~ Post 4

Hello. Again. Whoopwhoop 4th post. I'm almost done with the book! Very exciting. The book has actually been better then I expected... but anyway...

In the past few chapters, the whole trail case had begun to untwist and reveal what actually happened the night of Carl Heine's death. Also, the author has slowly revealed more about each individual character's past and the events that happened right before Carl's death. As I've learned so far, many fingers throughout the book have been pointed at Kabuo for being guilty because evidence such as the blood found on Kabuo's gaff was type B positive and could possibly match Carl'sone of the mooring ropes found on Carl's boat didn't match his other ones but matched Kabuos, and Kabuo was trained in kendo which could be used to injure another man. I'm excited to still see Kabuo's side of the story which I havn't read yet. I think that these pieces of evidence will become clear one I hear his testimony.

Secondly, one character I haven't mentioned in my posts is Ishmael who is writting a story for his newspaper. We learn that when Ishmael and Hatsue (Kabuo's wife) were teenagers, they had a little romance. After Hatsue left Ismael, (because they went their separate ways after Ismael went to war and Hatsue entered Manzanar), he was still in love with her and has carried this pain with him up until the trial. Ishmael runs into Hatsue and she complains to him that he needs to defend Kabuo in his newspaper. Hatue states, "People don't have to be unfair, do they" (Guterson 258)? Hatsue wants people to see that her husband is innocent and justice needs to be found.

Ishmael, in the book, is now trying to decide whether or not to bring a new piece of evidence to court concerning the night of Carl's death. Since Ishmael is still dealing with his grief over Hatsue and memories of World War II, he is struggling as to whether or not he should turn the trial around. Ishmael is a very interesting character that I believe does know that injustice is wrong, but stuggles to apply that to his own life because he is carrying his past with him. I think that Ishmael will show this new evidence that a huge freighter could have possibly made large enough waves to push Carl out of his boat.

Well, now I'm very excited to see if Kabuo will be sentenced guilty or innocent... and I think it all lays to in Ishmael's hands....