I was luckily part of #HowMuchOfTheseHillsIsGold#Readalong .This book was set in America’s Western gold rush period but came from the very unique angle of writing about a family of Chinese descent and the struggles of immigrants and cultural heritage.This was a topic I had never heard of before, and this book felt like it helped me learn a new page in world history.The author’s writing is very beautiful, in particular the landscape as seen through Lucy’s eyes felt so real. With lots of metaphors and quite abstract writing, it was sometimes a bit difficult for me to clearly understand what was going on, however, the more I read, the more I loved…
It’s such an interesting book about how stories are written, created and told. Very subtle and beautiful but really comical at the same time.The mystery part of this book was very beautifully written, but I personally think this book is not necessarily for mystery fans, it might be more appealing to literary fans. To avoid potential spoilers, I’m not going to write a detailed synopsis here, but the story starts at the library of rejected books, where unpublished manuscripts are stored. The young editor finds an extraordinary masterpiece hidden in the shelf! Who wrote this? – the book was so gripping and I found myself wondering all the way through…
#TheDutchHouse was such an interesting book that hooked me straight into the story of an unfortunate life of a family and a house.The characters were all so powerful, but at the same time, I thought every one of them was super unlikable!!! After finishing this book, I cannot stop imagining how the house would look like, and the portrait of Maeve… How do we consider people’s relationships with their house, such as the bonds and emotion with the physical structure and how it will become part of the history of the old buildings all around it… Participating in the #Readalong has always been fun, but especially for this one, exchanging the ideas of…
I was part of the #HamnetReadAlong and enjoyed this book so much that I had to write a little review about it (which I don’t normally do for the readalongs!!!) This book was about the beautiful love and loss of the family of famous playwright William Shakespeare. Written through the eyes of his wife Anne Hathaway, it perfectly captured the relationship between parents and children, siblings and relatives in fine detail. In this book, Shakespeare’s name is never mentioned. The effect of this is to better spotlight Anne, and brings a completely new perspective to the reader. Also, it’s worth noting that in the book Anne is called Agnes and the title…
Over the past year, it’s become such a massively hyped book that I even felt a little hesitant to read it at first; however, the unique setting and strong female protagonist made the reading experience extraordinarily fantastic, all in all! アメリカで出版され、英語圏で大ヒットとなった作品。人気すぎて読むのを躊躇ったほど。笑読みだしたらあっという間!ステキな主人公とユニークな舞台設定に魅せられ、ページを捲る手が止まりませんでした。 Abandoned by her family, the protagonist Kya grows up alone in a shack in the swampland. 主人公のカイアは幼い頃に家族に見捨てられ、たった一人で湿地で暮らしています。 Honestly speaking, it took me a while to get into the core plot; the first few chapters of the book in particular were slow going. It sounded like a very typical ‘poor kids from a disadvantaged background’ kind of story, but if you feel the same I did, please do persist beyond…
Are you a ‘feminist’? I think I am. It’s so sad to admit this but there are still so many misconceptions and negative stereotypes associated with feminists. あなたは「フェミニスト」ですか?私自身は自分をフェミニストだと思っています。世間ではフェミニストに対する誤解やネガティブなステレオタイプがまだ多くて、なんだか残念。 Do you support equality of men and women? I expect most of people would answer yes. Can you list some of the inconvenience or problems in society to achieve the equality? Can you at least try to understand what it means for me to make society ‘equal’ despite gender? What are all the frustrations I feel in everyday life? Isn’t society not really even trying to achieve the equality? 男女の平等を支持しますか?きっと多くの人がYESって答えると思うんです。でも、平等を実現するために、社会の不都合さや問題を挙げることはできますか?ジェンダーにとらわれない「平等」って一体何のことなのか、せめて理解するような姿勢を示すことができますか?私が感じている日々の不満はいったい何なのか。社会は本当に平等を実現するための努力をしているのでしょうか・・・ This book explains so much about frustration I feel towards the male…
This book is about an ordinary woman in a small town in coastal Maine named Olive Kitteridge. What does it mean to live and get older? This book gave me ideas about the beauty and cruelty of aging and made me think a lot about how I want my life to be like. アメリカの小さな港町に住むごく普通の女性、オリーヴ・キタリッジの物語。生きるとか、老いとか、とてもシンプルで美しくて、でも残酷なテーマについて、じっくり考えさせられた一冊です。 All the characters in this book were somewhat unlikable because their personalities were depicted so realistically. No one is perfect, that is the truth of being human. Everyone has their negative aspects and everyone can be very self centred. Thus this very very unlikable main character Olive was so convincing and she turned out to be…
This book was ‘YES!!!! That’s exactly what I would say in that situation!!!’ kind of book that I really enjoyed reading while I commute. 「そうそれ!よく言った!!」と思うような瞬間ばかり。通勤途中に笑いながら読みました。 The main character was Frances a 20-ish woman in uni, her friend Bobbi (ex-girlfriend) and people around her. Frances gets involved with a married guy and starts cheating. 主人公は20代の学生Francesと、彼女の元カノBobbi、そしてその周りの大人たち。Francesは既婚者と関わり浮気をはじめます。 They are all such unlikable characters but I kept laughing about all the things they say, especially Frances says about herself. It is impossible to empathise with their situations but it captures the feeling of awkwardness and anxiety realistically. 好きになれないキャラクターばかり登場しますが、彼らの会話がとてもおもしろい。特にFrancesの回想シーンが最高です。決して共感できる内容ではありませんが、居心地の悪さや不安をとてもリアルに描いた作品です。 This book has a similar feeling to Convenience Store Women, but does not tackle social issues so…
It was a story of survival from the infamous Auschwitz. Although it was very easy to read, the writing was not on an amazing level. It sounded too much like a cheap love story while I was supposed to be reading about the horror and inhumanity of Auschwitz. アウシュビッツの生存者の物語。とっても読みやすい作品ですが、決してよく書けているわけではないという印象。強制収容所のおどろおどろしい空気や、恐怖…そういったものが全く伝わってこず、安っぽいラブストーリーを読んでいるような気分になりました。 The book is based on the real story, including the love drama part. It’s such a miracle that the couple survived and the story of them is passed down to the world through this book all around the world. I really wished if this book had more depth in the writing, it would have become another one of the masterpieces on…
This book was not really about ‘story’ but conversations with interesting people who the main character Faye met throughout her journey in Greece. 「物語」ではなく、主人公 Fayeがギリシャで出会う人々との「会話」を楽しむ一冊。 It had a lot of black humour in it that made me smirk. Almost like a guilty pleasure, I found it hard to put it down. So many conversations I almost wanted to underline, just because they sounded so perfectly written! ブラック・ユーモアたっぷりで、思わず何度も鼻で笑ってしまいました。ずるずると引き込まれ、読みだしたら止まらない、そんな魅力があります。マーカーでハイライトしておきたくなってしまうような、完璧!な文章をいくつも見つけました。 It reminded me of Flights / Olga Tokarczuk a lot. If Flights was a collage of beautiful pictures, Outline was like a very insightful Instagram feed, including proverbs from someone you just met, and observations of people you happened to meet. All the people appeared…
Because of its catchy title and the very interesting background of the author (she works for convenience store), this book was everywhere when she won the Akutagawa Prize in 2016. 2016年に芥川賞を受賞した「コンビニ人間」、キャッチ―なタイトルと、作者自身もコンビニで働いているという経歴から、すごく注目されていました。 Because I tend to pick the book which is more relatable to myself, this book Convenience Store Woman was something I have been avoiding to pick up. I decided to give it a try when I found out it is finally translated into English… 私はより共感できそうな主人公の本を選んでしまう傾向にあるので、この本はどちらかというと避けてきた一冊。でも今回、英訳が出版されると聞いて、なんとなく手に取ってみました。 Surprisingly, I really enjoyed reading this book. It was about the life of a woman who finds it hard to assimilate with the societal norm to behave ‘normally’ in Japan. The main character works…
Reading this book reminded me a lot about The Great Gatsby. It had a similar subtle flamboyant feel in the setting of the story. The personality of very noble and sophisticated gentleman made me so impressed by the elegance of his lifestyle and ways of thinking. どことなくグレート・ギャツビーを思い起こさせる一冊でした。華やかでキラキラした世界。そして主人公であるジェントルマンのエレガントなふるまいやライフスタイルが、なんだか読んでいて心地よかった。 It had a good essence of the historical background of Moscow around 1920s. Because the main character the gentleman is under the house arrest at the Metropol hotel, the story did not really mention anything about the world outside of the hotel. This seclusion from the outer society and how people react to this situation were well described in this book. 1920年代のロシア、モスクワが舞台ですが、主人公がホテルに自宅軟禁されているという設定のため、歴史背景描写は必要最低限。それなのに効果的に時代の空気を感じさせます。軟禁状態にあるという状況と、それをどのように感じ日々を過ごすのか、そういう心境を、とても丁寧に描いたストーリーです。 Although…