Brenda's Bookshelf

“Look, unless you’re writing one, a self-help book is an oxymoron. You read a self-help book so someone who isn’t yourself can help you, that someone being the author…None of the foregoing means that self-help books are useless. On the contrary they can be useful indeed, but it does mean that the idea of self in the land of self-help is a slippery one.”

And with this intriguing beginning we are thrown in to the beguiling story of one man’s journey to become filthy rich in rising Asia.

Our unnamed hero is the third child in a impoverished family who moves to a larger unnamed city somewhere in what might be India. And slowly, by following the precepts that begin with each chapter: “Move to the City,” “Get an Education,” and  “Don’t Fall in Love,” etc., he grows up and establishes himself as a successful businessman in the big city. What is interesting however is that although he does try to follow each precept, life is not always so cut and dried. The boy does try and get an education, but his opportunities for education are limited and corporal punishment the norm. The boy does fall in love with a “pretty little girl,” but for many reasons they are unable to be together, and although as a man becomes prosperous, prosperity does not bring him the satisfaction that it promised.

Narrated in second person with a wry and slightly condescending tone, this novel as self-help book is both unique and smart. The choice to leave both our narrator and the place unnamed lends a sense of universality to this book, but Hamid grounds it with details about our heroes’ family, the measures he employs to build up his business and the poignancy of the love story between our hero and the pretty little girl.

The writing is simple and directive, as one would expect from a self-help book and yet Hamid is able to bring a depth of understanding to this story that helps to bridge the gap between our experience and the experiences of those living in rising Asia with deft and sharpness:

“…Huddled shivering on the packed earth under your mother’s cot one cold, dewy morning. Your anguish is the anguish of a boy whose chocolate has been thrown away, whose remote controls are out of batteries, whose scooter is busted, whose new sneakers have been stolen. This is all the more remarkable since you’ve never in your life seen any of these things.”

This is a book that is informative, fun, and touching all at the same time-a true gem!

Brenda’s Rating: *****(5 Stars out of 5)

Recommend this book to: Keith, Ken, Sharon, Marian and Lauren

Book Study Worthy: Yes

Read in ebook format

On a remote island in Canada, Ruth, a novelist who has been struggling with ennui and writer’s block, comes across a small package in the surf on the beach near her home. When she unwraps the package she finds a Hello Kitty lunchbox containing a diary written by a 16 year old girl in Japan, some letters written in Japanese, and some other mementos. Wondering if this package could be detritus from the Japanese Tsunami, Ruth, who herself is Japanese takes these gifts from the sea as a sign, and begins to read the diary, hoping that they might help her come to terms with her own life.

Nao, the young writer of the diary, announces in the first pages of her diary that she plans on killing herself, but has set herself the task of writing a biography of her great grandmother, a famous Buddhist nun, before she can carry out her plan. Initially, Nao wrties about what has brought her to this decision, but as she begins to chronicle the events of her great grandmother’s life both before and after becoming a nun, she begins to find out more about her own family; the uncle who was a kamikaze pilot in WWII and her own father who after failing in a job in the US during the dot.com bubble, returns to Japan as a shadow of himself.

Ruth, is soon caught up in the diary and as she realizes Nao’s strong commitment to kill herself, she wants to reach out and somehow stop what surely has already happened.  Ruth’s begins to do some research using clues she finds in the diary, but this leads her nowhere, and she is trapped both by time and lack of information and is unable to influence or change what is unfolding before her in the diary in the present but has already occurred in the past..

Ozeki is a gifted writer. She captures the cadence and attitude of both the 16 year old Nao and the gentle, obfuscating speech of  her 100 year old grandmother as well as depicting Ruth, a middle aged novelist who has seemingly lost her voice.  Ozeki writes with deep insight and a thorough knowledge of Japan and its culture, especially with regard to Nao’s re-integration into Japanese society after living in the US.  The subject matter of this book is quite challenging however, with themes of suicide, depression, extreme bullying, and the kamikaze pilots of WWII.  Although, Ozeki handles these themes with dexterity and grace, I sometimes felt overwhelmed by a cumulative sadness for these characters and their tremendous struggles and at other times I was furious at the defeatist attitude of Nao’s parents, particularly, her father. In the end however, Ozeki manages to bring this story to a satisfying, although somewhat contrived conclusion, and we are reminded again of our shared humanity, and the way we influence people without even knowing it

Brenda’s Rating: ****(4 Stars out of 5) 

Recommend this book to: Sharon. Lauren, Marian, Keith and Ken

Book Study Worthy? Yes

Read in ebook format.