Book Review: A Tale for Time Being

The other day I was going around my school library cos I had some free time before a workshop and I came across this section just for leisurely reads! I was completely taken by surprise, because I love books and most of UBS’ books are academic, so I've never borrowed a book just to read on my own (from the University Library, that is).

"Great Reads" Section at Corner Library

So I happened to be walking by, and I'm not sure if you can see the book I ended up borrowing in the above picture, above but for some reason my hand just gravitated towards it. I pulled it out and I immediately fell in love with the cover. 

The cover does kind of pop!

I love reading. One thing that I hate about having a busy life is that I seldom have the time to set aside for reading, as I love to do that hours at a time, just curl under by blanket and immerse myself into this new world. I get so attached to the characters that once I've finished, I feel like a lose a little part of me, because the life of that character will be no more. They’ll have reached the end of their journey and leaving me hanging…

For some strange reason, I didn't feel this way for this book. That doesn't necessarily mean I hated it, or I felt detached from the characters, but I just felt a great sense of resolve, even though the great mystery isn't technically solved. 

So this book follows the story of Ruth who finds a mysterious diary that has floated on to shore from Japan. Ruth is a Japanese novelist who moved into a remote village for her husband. To be honest, I’m not sure if the actual author is writing about herself because I mean it does all fit, but I’m not sure if her finding Naoko’s diary is fictional or not.

So Ruth finds this diary, right? And she gets all worked up because Naoko has a pretty emotionally turbulent life, and she might be dead by the means of: suicide, tsunami, etc. Ruth then gets absorbed into Naoko's life and becomes obsessed with finding her, even though it's been ten years since Naoko's finished her diary. The story gets a tinge supernatural (and corny) at the end with disappearing and reappearing pages that happens to rewrite itself as Ruth begins to acknowledge whatever is the thing she needed to realize.

The book is cut into a series of 3 parts and within these parts the book goes back and forth between Nao’s world and Ruth’s world. Honestly though, during the first third of the book I dreaded reading Ruth’s sections because she is just so whiny and she just bitches about everything including her friends and husband, but later I really did end up liking her and appreciated her quest to find Nao. Because she cared, I cared. I would say that Ruth’s character development is subtle, whereas Nao’s journey is way more eventful and turbulent. Either way, I have a great fondness for Nao, and great respect for Ruth.

Anyways, I really did like this book. I fell completely in love with Nao: her enduring innocence despite all of the wicked sick things that she experiences. I’m actually quite sure that I came across this tale by pure coincidence, but how do we know that I wasn't destined to find it and read it just as Ruth did of Nao’s diary?

I give this book 3.5 out of 5 stars, because it was really good but I would have enjoyed it way more with less Ruth time and more Nao time. Nao is a charming girl who won my heart and sympathy and all of that jazz. Ruth was just okay. I know that the point of her parts was to show the process of looking for Nao, but I wish she just kept it shorter.

- Ginger