The novel, "composed of four verse novellas narrated by working-class Hawaiian teenagers...explore[d] such subjects as ethnic identity, sexual awakening, drug use, and abusive relationships."
In 1996, Yamanaka’s second book, Wild Meat and the Bully Burgers, again told in Pidgin, was a coming-of-age story made up of "a series of connected vignettes" that "examin[ed] larger issues of class and ethnicity".
However, Michael Porter, of the New York Times Book Review applauded Yamanaka's efforts, stating that "[she] delivers a precise look at this vibrant 'Japanese-American' culture yet still speaks to anyone who has experienced the joy, security and small humiliations of family life."
The story of a thirteen-year-old girl who finds herself caught between her abusive uncle and older boyfriend, it is based on two poems from her collection Saturday Night at the Pahala Theatre and has been described as "brutal.
In the book, a young woman is haunted by ghosts which ends in what a Kirkus Reviews contributor called a "beautifully tragic" outcome.
[3] Carol Haggas of Booklist wrote the book was a "richly atmospheric novel which paints a chillingly spectral portrait of souls tormented by love and guilt.
[6] "Lois-Ann Yamanaka's fiction focuses on young, working-class Japanese-Americans from Hawaii who struggle with such typical issues of adolescence as sexual development and peer acceptance while coming to terms with their cultural identity as the descendants of Japanese immigrant laborers.
"[citation needed] "Yamanaka once said,' My work involves bringing to the page the utter complexity, ferocious beauty and sometimes absurdity of our ethnic relationships here in the islands.
She also stated that she considered herself privileged to be categorized amongst other female Asian American writers such as Maxine Hong Kingston and Amy Tan.