#japanesebooks

[unfoldingmoments]

Days at Morasaki Bookshop

I don’t know. I think maybe I’ve been wasting my time, just doing nothing. I don’t think so. It’s important to stand still sometimes. Think of it as a little rest in the long journey of your life. This is your harbor. And your boat is just dropping anchor here for a little while. And after you’re well rested, you can set sail again.

Human beings are full of contradictions.

It’s funny. No matter where you go, or how many books you read, you still know nothing, you haven’t seen anything. And that’s life. We live our lives trying to find our way. It’s like that Santōka Taneda poem, the one that goes, ‘On and on, in and in, and still the blue-green mountains.’

The act of seeing is no small thing. To see something is to be possessed by it. Sometimes it carries off a part of you, sometimes it’s your whole soul. - Motojirō Kajii’s, "Landscapes of the Heart"

It started in my late teens. I was feeling depressed. I couldn’t see the value of life anymore. I couldn’t seem to fit in, at home or at school. I just withdrew into myself and closed everything else out. I was overly self-conscious, I had too many ideals and ambitions for one person, and because of that, I ended up without a single one I could hold on to. I was an empty person. That’s what I was. It seemed like there was absolutely nowhere I belonged in this world. You were born right around that time. I first met you when my sister brought you back home to introduce my father and everyone to his new granddaughter. The instant I saw you, so tiny wrapped up in your blanket, sleeping so peacefully, I thought I might cry. How can I put it? I could feel the mystery of life filling my heart. The idea of this child growing up, experiencing so many things for the first time, absorbing so much—all of it brought me as much joy as if it were happening to me.

All of a sudden, I felt as if my twisted heart was being filled with warm light. It was still blurry, but I could feel a sense of purpose growing within me. That’s when I made my decision. It was time to stop shutting myself up in a cage. It was time to get moving, to look around, and learn what I could from it all. Time to go in search of a place where I belonged, a place where I could say with confidence that I felt right. All the trips I went on, all the books I read, were the consequences of that decision. In other words, Takako, meeting you led me to a kind of epiphany. “An epiphany . . . That’s amazing.” “So, that’s what I mean when I say you’re the one who saved me. That’s why I’ll do anything for you.

The joy of realizing that someone loved me that much made my heart want to burst. I tried to make a joke to hold back the tears welling up in my eyes. “Uncle,” I said, “that’s not exactly dialogue you should deliver while you’re eating shredded squid.

“My uncle laughed out loud. “So did you end up finding the place you belonged?” “Well, I guess you might say that. But it took me many years to get there.” My uncle nodded quietly. “This is it. Our little, rundown Morisaki Bookshop. I had so many aspirations. I flew all over the world only to end up back at the place I’d known every bit of since I was a child. Hilarious, isn’t it? After all that time, I came back here. That’s when I finally realized it wasn’t just a question of where I was. It was about something inside me. No matter where I went, no matter who I was with, if I could be honest with myself, then that was where I belonged. By the time I realized that, half my life was over. So I went back to my favorite harbor, and I decided to drop anchor. For me, this is a sacred place. It’s where I feel most at ease.” “That reminds me,” I said. “A long time ago, Sabu told me that you were the store’s savior.” He laughed. “Its savior? That’s a pretty big exaggeration. Basically, when my father fell ill, the business was on the brink—all I did was take over and keep it going. At first, my father was pretty strongly opposed to me taking over the shop. It was a tough time in the used book business, after all, and I was this irresponsible guy. But I got down on my knees and pleaded with him to entrust the shop to me.

This shop might not be indispensable for most people, but if it matters that much to even just one other person, then I feel I can keep it going for decades. It’s like the line from Naoe Kinoshita in "Confessions of a Husband", ‘My boat travels lightly, drifting aimlessly at the mercy of the current.’ That’s how I want to live my life with this shop,” my uncle said, and then he smiled without saying any more.

Don’t be afraid to love someone. When you fall in love, I want you to fall in love all the way. Even if it ends in heartache, please don’t live a lonely life without love. I’ve been so worried that because of what happened you’ll give up on falling in love. Love is wonderful. I don’t want you to forget that. Those memories of people you love, they never disappear. They go on warming your heart as long as you live. When you get old like me, you’ll understand. I don’t think it really matters whether you know a lot about books or not. That said, I don’t know that much myself. But I think what matters far more with a book is how it affects you.

Excerpt From: Satoshi Yagisawa. “Days at the Morisaki Bookshop.”

[antonknightsblog]

The Memory Police: A Novel

Finalist for the International Booker Prize and the National Book Award.

On an unnamed island off an unnamed coast, objects are disappearing: first hats, then ribbons, birds, roses—until things become much more serious. Most of the island's inhabitants are oblivious to these changes, while those few imbued with the power to recall the lost objects live in fear of the draconian Memory Police, who are committed to ensuring that what has disappeared remains forgotten.

When a young woman who is struggling to maintain her career as a novelist discovers that her editor is in danger from the Memory Police, she concocts a plan to hide him beneath her floorboards. As fear and loss close in around them, they cling to her writing as the last way of preserving the past.

A surreal, provocative fable about the power of memory and the trauma of loss, The Memory Police is a stunning new work from one of the most exciting contemporary authors writing in any language.

A haunting Orwellian novel about the terrors of state surveillance, from the acclaimed author of The Housekeeper and the Professor. On an unnamed island, objects are disappearing: first hats, then ribbons, birds, roses. . . . Most of the inhabitants are oblivious to these changes, while those few able to recall the lost objects live in fear of the draconian Memory Police, who are committed to ensuring that what has disappeared remains forgotten. When a young writer discovers that her editor is in danger, she concocts a plan to hide him beneath her f loorboards, and together they cling to her writing as the last way of preserving the past. Powerful and provocative, The Memory Police is a stunning novel about the trauma of loss. ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR THE NEW YORK TIMES * THE WASHINGTON POST * TIME * CHICAGO TRIBUNE * THE GUARDIAN * ESQUIRE * THE DALLAS MORNING NEWS * FINANCIAL TIMES * LIBRARY JOURNAL * THE A.V. CLUB * KIRKUS REVIEWS * LITERARY HUB

Yōko Ogawa (小川 洋子) was born in Okayama, Okayama Prefecture, graduated from Waseda University, and lives in Ashiya. Since 1988, she has published more than twenty works of fiction and nonfiction.

Yōko Ogawa is able to give expression to the most subtle workings of human psychology in prose that is gentle yet penetrating.' The subtlety in part lies in the fact that Ogawa's characters often seem not to know why they are doing what they are doing. She works by accumulation of detail, a technique that is perhaps more successful in her shorter works; the slow pace of development in the longer works requires something of a deus ex machina to end them. The reader is presented with an acute description of what the protagonists, mostly but not always female, observe and feel and their somewhat alienated self-observations, some of which is a reflection of Japanese society and especially women's roles within in it. The tone of her works varies, across the works and sometimes within the longer works, from the surreal, through the grotesque and the--sometimes grotesquely--humorous, to the psychologically ambiguous and even disturbing.

On an unnamed island off an unnamed coast, objects are disappearing: first hats, then ribbons, birds, roses—until things become much more serious. Most of the island's inhabitants are oblivious to these changes, while those few imbued with the power to recall the lost objects live in fear of the draconian Memory Police, who are committed to ensuring that what has disappeared remains forgotten.

When a young woman who is struggling to maintain her career as a novelist discovers that her editor is in danger from the Memory Police, she concocts a plan to hide him beneath her floorboards. As fear and loss close in around them, they cling to her writing as the last way of preserving the past.

A surreal, provocative fable about the power of memory and the trauma of loss, The Memory Police is a stunning new work from one of the most exciting contemporary authors writing in any language.

A haunting Orwellian novel about the terrors of state surveillance, from the acclaimed author of The Housekeeper and the Professor. On an unnamed island, objects are disappearing: first hats, then ribbons, birds, roses. . . . Most of the inhabitants are oblivious to these changes, while those few able to recall the lost objects live in fear of the draconian Memory Police, who are committed to ensuring that what has disappeared remains forgotten. When a young writer discovers that her editor is in danger, she concocts a plan to hide him beneath her f loorboards, and together they cling to her writing as the last way of preserving the past. Powerful and provocative, The Memory Police is a stunning novel about the trauma of loss. ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR THE NEW YORK TIMES * THE WASHINGTON POST * TIME * CHICAGO TRIBUNE * THE GUARDIAN * ESQUIRE * THE DALLAS MORNING NEWS * FINANCIAL TIMES * LIBRARY JOURNAL * THE A.V. CLUB * KIRKUS REVIEWS * LITERARY HUB

[cityboysclub]

[centershoppingonlines]

Business Brilliance Sale up to 20% : Here are some previous selections for the "Financial Times Business Book of the Year Award" Shop Now! 🛍 Click👉https://atth.me/go/anDFNVcG 📅 From 1 - 30 November 2023 *Terms and conditions apply

[japanesequiz]

SFは、あまり好きなジャンルではないけれども、この短編集は楽しめた。最近、福袋のようなアンソロジーが好き♪ #はじめての #島本理生 #辻村深月 #宮部みゆき #森絵都 #japanesereading #japaneselanguage #japaneseliterature #japanesebook #japanesestories #japanesequiz #brisbanelibraries #アンソロジー #図書館大好き #海外の図書館 #読書記録 https://www.instagram.com/p/CpxU5kDqAuX/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=

[monniebiloney]

Book Sale!

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0B4GH2L7K/

My Coloring book is currently on sale on amazon for only $4! crazyness, I can’t even buy it that cheaply. Buy it now to get access to the kickstarter rewards with it! Here’s an example of how the book works for Japanese Learners

[celinebookine]

Hi there 🌱

💬 I’ll be publishing pictures and short texts about books mostly, but I may also share some nature and writing related content…

🔖 You can find me on Instagram @celine_bookine

📚 To be continued…

[yamazakuracouk]

Samurai

[jamiepedrazzoliauthor]

Travel Around the World with these books!

[bahhumpug]

Where The Wild Ladies Are by Aoko Matsuda is a quirky collection of interwoven short stories tinged with a modern spin on traditional ghost stories. Often I'd start a story and be confused or even a little bored but as I read on I always got swept into the story & characters. There is something about her writing that is quiet and unassuming, while being alluring in some intangible way. Some of the stories aren't even real full stories. But taken as a whole they tell us about a strange view of ghosts & the afterlife. * #funaekreads #funaekbooks #instabooks #instareads #pugsandbooks #bookreview #booksintranslation #translatedbook #translatedfiction #japaneseauthors #japanesebooks #shortstories #shortstorycollection #tiltedaxispress #softskullpress https://www.instagram.com/p/CGDRO2PgpIo/?igshid=5w4yvxcrbhaf

[paddypikala]

July wrap up

[centershoppingonlines]

Bongkoch Comics on Screen หนังสือการ์ตูนดังที่คุณรักได้เปลี่ยนร่างเป็นภาพยนตร์! ไม่พลาดโอกาสในการติดตามเรื่องราวที่คุ้นเคยในรูปแบบใหม่บนหน้าจอ แล้วติดตาม สะสมหนังสือเล่มไปพร้อมๆกัน ลด 20% ช้อปเลย! 🛍 คลิก👉https://atth.me/go/bqp5hgYS 📅 ตั้งแต่วันที่ 1 พ.ย. 66 - 30 พ.ย. 66 *เงื่อนไขเป็นไปตามที่บริษัทฯ กำหนด

[buzzbookstore]

Pardon the drips... “... perfumed with notes of cherry, oolong tea, white pepper, sage flower, fall spices and hibiscus...” #wineandbooks #cabernet #cabernetfranc #titus #wino #japan #japanesebooks #cherryblossoms #booknerd #shelfie #wineoclock #redwine #oldbooks #bookcollectingforgraphicartists https://www.instagram.com/p/CDSN8hWBCDV/?igshid=k5a403dar3wg

[tachyonpub]

Check out the Japanese editions of Lovecraft's Monsters! They had to break it into two volumes in the translation. Which one do you prefer? Thanks Jabberwocky for the pic! . . #books #bookstagram #lovecraftsmonsters #hplovecraft #lovecraft #ellendatlow #japanesebooks #foreignedition #translatedbooks #anthology #booklife #publishing #bookcovers #lovecraftian #horror #horrorbooks #horrorbookstagram https://www.instagram.com/p/B812luTHJwd/?igshid=574f54ib2ssy

[talktothesunhandmade]

No sunshine due to the typhoon... in this weather, it feels dull and lazy. To lighten up my afternoon, I’m reading this eco-wrapping craft book. I discovered these two zip-lock style gift bags buried in the bottom of the storage box... gotta use them to include something cute. If you have these small gift bags, what would you wrap? My first thought is to wrap my stamps when my customer wants a gift wrapping option.... . . The craft book was about gift wrapping but is more about keeping some elements from product packages and reuse them to make a cute gift wrapping like keeping the handles of paper bags and repurpose the handles and use the body of the paper bags as well. The techniques of gift wrapping itself is pretty basic but very nice book with simple instruction and minimalist style. . . . . . . . #talktothesun #handmade #craft #craftbook #bookoftheday #crafting #giftwrapping #packaging #giftbags #books #bookreview #japanesebooks #craftsupplies #giftwrap #paperlovers #inspiration #craftideas #diyideas #cuteness #weekendvibes https://www.instagram.com/p/B0IG_OYgBVk/?igshid=1fakeub49fyjn

[backpacksnstuff]

Have you seen “I’m Thinking of Ending Things”? Well, if you want to have a similar experience by reading a book (any other book, not just Iain Reid’s), here you go (どうぞ☺️). A simple story about a woman, whose husband disappeared thirteen years ago leaving her with a small daughter, coming to terms with her loss and letting it go, suddenly takes a surreal form. It’s dreamy, blurry, haunty; the main heroine is followed by people nobody sees, real people’s faces and landscape change all the time and sounds disappear suddenly. You’ll like it if you feel comfortable in other people’s dreams. Or nightmares. #bookstagram #bookstagrammers #instabook #instabookstagram #whattoread #whattoreadnext #whatimreading #womenintranslation #womenintranslationmonth #WiT #manazuru #hiromikawakami #japaneseliterature #japaneseauthor #japanesebooks #mysterybooks (at Tallinn, Estonia) https://www.instagram.com/p/CS4_gLEAozq/?utm_medium=tumblr