Days At The Morisaki Bookshop

"Human beings are full of contradictions." Twenty-five-year-old Takako takes up residence for a few months in her uncle Satoru's second-hand bookshop in Jimbicho, Tokyo in the wake of her breakup with her cad of a boyfriend/ coworker and her subsequent resignation. Depressed and unemployed, Takako is glad for the room above the Morisaki Bookshop to hide from the rest of the world even though she doesn't quite enjoy reading. Surrounded by towering stacks of second-hand books and people who love reading, Takako eventually finds herself opening up to new experiences, making friends in the community, forging a bond with her uncle and finding joy, inspiration and hope in reading. The narrative is divided into two segments the first of which focuses on Takano's journey and the second segment, set a year later, revolves around her uncle and his wife Momoko whose sudden return five years after she left him has him seeking the answers to several unanswered questions. Her aunt's return and their evolving friendship also encourage Takako to reconsider her own priorities. "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." Touching upon themes of family, friendship, new beginnings and most importantly the transformative power of books, this is a sweet, simple story that would appeal to book lovers and bibliophiles. I really liked the premise of Days at the Morisaki Bookshop by Satoshi Yagisawa (translated by Eric Ozawa), and loved the descriptions of the Jimbocho Book Town (brought back some fond memories of College Street /"Boi Para" of Kolkata, India) and the literary references. The author also references the Kanda Used Book Festival, the largest annual event held in Kanda's Jimbocho secondhand book district that started in 1960. The narrative is evenly paced and compact but I thought the writing (or maybe the translation) was a tad choppy and lacking in depth. Though I didn't enjoy the second segment of the narrative as much as the first, overall I didn't dislike this short novel its totality"--