The Essential Reading List for 2020

By Corinne Kennedy

Dokusho no Aki - 読書の秋, or “Autumn, The Season for Reading” is a common saying in Japan, and it’s a popular time of the year for all kinds of themed reading lists to be published. As the days grow colder and the nights get longer here in Seattle, books are a welcome companion. For your fall enrichment, Corinne Kennedy has compiled an eclectic list of 12 titles that she recommends: eight works of fiction – six by Japanese authors & two by Japanese American authors; and four non-fiction works on Japanese aesthetics, culture & garden design.

Maple leaves in autumn: Acer japonicum ‘Vitifolium’. (photo: Aleks Monk)

FICTION (contemporary fiction by Japanese authors, in English translation):

·         Convenience Store Woman (2016) by Sayaka Murata. English translation (2018) by Ginny Tapley Takemori. This novella is the first-person narrative of a single woman who has worked part-time for 18 years in a Tokyo convenience store. She has never fit in, and at the age of 36 is increasingly feeling pressured by family, acquaintances, and co-workers to start a proper career – and find a husband! Reviewers have described it as “fun, thought-provoking and at times outrageous” – and “darkly comic,” as well as “brilliant, witty, and sweet.”

·         Lion Cross Point (2013) by Masatsugu Ono. English Translation (2018) by Angus Turvill. In Ono’s novella, a ten-year-old boy arrives at his mother’s home village, traumatized by his memories but unable to talk about them. ”At once a subtle portrayal of a child’s sense of memory and community, an empowering exploration of how we find the words to encompass our trauma, and a spooky Japanese ghost story… Acts of heartless brutality mix with surprising moments of pure kindness, creating this utterly truthful, cathartic tale of an unforgettable young boy.” [from the publisher]

·         The Little House (2010) by Kyoko Nakajima. English translation (2019) by Ginny Tapley Takemori. In the early Showa era, before World War II, a housemaid writes of her years working for a middleclass family, in a modest “little house.” With the novel’s startling final chapter, however, her journal of nostalgic memories is transformed and another “dramatic, flesh-and-blood story takes shape. Nakajima manages to combine skillful dialogue with a dazzling ending… a polished, masterful work.” [from the publisher]

·         The Lonesome Bodybuilder (2012) by Yukiko Motoya. English translation (2018) by Asa Yoneda. This short story collection is the author’s first book to be translated into English. Reviewers have described it as “a deft combination of magic realism and contemporary irony, dosed with some surreal humor” [Kirkus Reviews] and as a collection of “eleven offbeat modern fables that confront loneliness and selfhood.” [Booklist]

·         A Man (2018) by Keiichiro Hirano.  English Translation (2020) by Eli K. P. William. A psychological thriller about a divorce attorney who agrees to investigate a former client’s recently deceased husband, who had assumed another man’s identity.  An entertaining and suspenseful novel that has been compared to Raymond Chandler’s works, it’s also a serious exploration of ”the search for identity, the ambiguity of memory, the legacies with which we live and die, and the reconciliation of who you hoped to be with who you've actually become.” [from the publisher]

·         Ms Ice Sandwich (2013) by Mieko Kawakami. English translation (2017) by Louise Heal Kawai. A novella suitable for YA readers, this coming-of-age story is about a young boy obsessed with a woman who sells sandwiches at the local supermarket. His father has died, his fortune-teller mother is distracted, and his grandmother is dying – so he visits the supermarket almost daily, just to watch the woman he calls “Ms Ice Sandwich” at her work. But everything changes, and his visits end abruptly, after classmates refer to her as “such a freak.” “Tender, warm, yet unsentimental, Ms Ice Sandwich is a story about new starts, parents who have departed, and the importance of saying goodbye.” [from the publisher]

Japanese snowbell bears attractive egg-shaped fruits every fall. (photo: Chie Iida)

FICTION (contemporary fiction by Japanese American authors):

·         Sansei and Sensibility (2020) by Karen Tei Yamashita. Short stories originally published between 1975-2019, mostly set in California’s third-generation Japanese American (Sansei) community. According to the publisher, "The protagonists of these skillful and inventive stories have traveled various paths--from Japan to Brazil, L.A. to Gardena, San Francisco to Tokyo--but along the way, they have all become archivists, whether they know it or not. They examine the contents of deceased relatives' freezers, tape-record high-school locker-room chatter, cart the contents of a household cross-country… They sparkle with Karen's signature wit and humor while diving into questions of race, class, colonialism, immigration, and, above all, inheritance--familial, cultural, emotional, artistic, and otherwise.” In the book’s second half, she reimagines Jane Austen’s novels in 1960s & 70s Japanese America.

·         When the Emperor Was Divine (2003) by Julie Otsuka. A Japanese American family is torn apart during World War II, the husband arrested on conspiracy charges and the mother and two children incarcerated in a desert internment camp. The daughter comforts her brother with bedtime stories, but the grim conditions are traumatic, and the family gets only occasional blacked-out letters from the father. In the final chapter, after the father is released, he expresses his own fierce anger – and that of all who suffered the injustice of incarceration. “Heartbreaking, bracingly unsentimental. . . .rais[es] the specter of wartime injustice in bone-chilling fashion. . . . The novel’s honesty and matter-of-fact tone in the face of inconceivable injustice are the source of its power.” [Publisher’s Weekly]

The glowing yellow fall color of the Garden’s three tall, slender ginkgo trees. (photo: Aleks Monk)

NON-FICTION (Japanese aesthetics, culture, and garden design):

·         The Beauty of Everyday Things by Soetsu Yanagi (1889-1961). English translation (2018) by Michael Brase. In his travels through Japan, Yanagi was inspired by humble craftspeople and their creations – hence the essays collected in this book. “The Japanese word for ‘folk craft’ or ‘folk art’, mingei, is actually new to the language… Literally, the word means ‘crafts of the people.’ It is meant to stand in contrast to aristocratic fine arts, and refers to objects used by ordinary people in their daily lives. These objects include household effects such as clothing, furniture, eating utensils, and stationary…They are not made for viewing pleasure but for daily use. In other words, they are objects indispensable to the daily lives of ordinary people.” [from the book’s first chapter] Illustrated with photographs of objects from the Japan Folk Crafts Museum, which Yanagi established in 1936, these essays reveal the simple, functional beauty of ordinary, everyday things.

·         Japanese Design, Art, Aesthetics and Culture (2014) by Patricia J. Graham. Written by an expert on Asian art, this work is a comprehensive presentation of the arts, aesthetics and culture of Japan, and includes more than 160 color photographs. With a historical/cultural perspective, Graham traces the development of an aesthetics based on simplicity and fine craftsmanship.

·         The Japanese Tea Garden (2009) by Marc Peter Keane. Written by an American landscape architect, researcher and educator who lived in Kyoto for 18 years, this is an important resource for garden lovers as well as design professionals. The publisher calls this 2009 work – which covers the history, aesthetics, and design of tea gardens, from T’ang China to the present – “the most extensive book on this genre ever published in English.” Included are over 115 photographs, floor plans and other illustrations.

·         Japan’s Master Gardens: Lessons in Space and Environment (2011) by Stephen Mansfield. From a Japan-based photojournalist, this richly illustrated exploration of the beauty and history of Japanese gardens is not simply a glossy coffee table book. Mansfield examines perceptions of nature and space in Japanese culture and design – and the underlying principles as well as outward forms of Japanese gardens. He considers the garden types that have been developed – including austere dry stream gardens, small courtyard gardens, and expansive stroll gardens. ”The visual tour of 25 master gardens allows the reader to appreciate the exquisite details of each place, while also discerning the fundamental aesthetic principles that underlie the Japanese garden.” [Publisher’s Weekly]

NON-FICTION (Seattle Japanese Garden):

·         Washington Park Arboretum Bulletin, Vol. 82, No. 2 (Summer 2020 Issue, honoring the 60th Anniversary of the Seattle Japanese Garden). All articles are available online at

http://seattlejapanesegardencommunityblog.blogspot.com/2020/08/arboretum-summer-bulletin-features.html

Note:  for reading lists on other themes, see blog articles from past years:  in November 2019, works on Japanese plants & garden design, Seattle’s parks & the Seattle Japanese Garden; memoirs, haiku poetry & mindfulness; and novels by Japanese authors; in November 2018,  works translated from Japanese into English (classic memoir, classic fiction & contemporary fiction); in October 2017, histories of Japanese Americans in the Pacific Northwest & Japanese American artists in the Pacific Northwest; in November 2016, Japanese American fiction and Japanese gardens & garden design; and in November 2015, works of fiction & non-fiction, by Japanese & Japanese American authors.

Corinne Kennedy is a Garden Guide, frequent contributor to the Seattle Japanese Garden blog, and retired garden designer.