Cartoonist Keiji Nakazawa was seven years old and living in Hiroshima in the early days of August 1945 when the city was destroyed by an atomic bomb dropped by the United States. Starting a few months before that event, his ten-volume saga Barefoot Gen shows life in Japan after years of war and privations, as seen through the eyes of seven-year-old Gen Nakaoka. In Volume Nine, Gen continues to confront one setback after another -- the loss of his home, the death of a friend -- when a chance encounter gives new direction to his life. An impoverished but talented artist takes Gen under his wing and teaches him to paint. Inspired by the artist's assertion that "art has no borders," Gen vows to become an artist himself, and takes a job as apprentice to a local poster painter. Despite merciless bullying from his boss and the older apprentices, Gen perseveres in the pursuit of his new calling.