The Rabbit Hole
The Plotters (Un-Su Kim)
This one's pretty dark. But it did seriously make me think about questioning authority. Who makes the decisions? Are those who are being used aware that they are only pawns in a game? One line that hit me, that you'll understand if you read it: "What if there's no one sitting in the chair at all?"
Synopsis: In a dark version of Seoul, Korea, that's run by a network of crime syndicates, an assassin, after sparing a target, realizes that maybe he has not cared enough about what is truly going on behind the scenes.
Lucy's Rating:
Paired stuff: An American classic that the themes of this one really reminded me of was George Orwell's 1984 dystopian, about questioning authority. If you like that kind of stuff, I'd look into some of philosopher Arendt's ideas on blind obedience.
Before the Coffee Gets Cold (Toshikazu Kawaguchi)
Another-another magical realism translated Japanese fiction about time-travel, regret, love, and accepting what you can and cannot change.
Synopsis: A magical coffee shop allows customers to time-travel — that is, only until their coffee grows cold. Similar to all the other works in that they follow different people with different stories.
Lucy's Rating:
We'll Prescribe You a Cat (Syou Ishida)
Another cute translated Japanese fiction book. Short and sweet, very much a summer read. Similar to Hot Chocolate on Tuesdays in the writing style, and the fact that it follows multiple different people, but otherwise that’s about it.
Synopsis: A man dealing with depression is led to a small hole-in-the-wall “medicine shop” that prescribes him a kitten to help. Each new story consists of a new person, helped along with a cat.
Lucy's Rating:
Sisters in Yellow (Mieko Kawakami)
More of a dark, survival-in-the-streets esque, definitely in the noir genre, so very different from Hot Chocolate on Tuesdays, if that's not your cup of tea. I think it's especially impactful for teenagers, and explores how much you're willing to sacrifice for a dream.
Synopsis: A young woman and her friend struggle in the streets of 1980s Tokyo, attempting to escape their criminal lives and open a bar together.
Lucy's Rating:
Hot Chocolate on Thursday(Michio Aoyama)
Just the absolute cutest, coziest piece of literature. My favorite kind of book, personally. It's not dramatic, but shows how different life is for people who coexist simultaneously. You can just sit down, and read, and it’s just life but in a book. A short, one-sitting book.
Synopsis: Starting from a young worker in a small Japanese coffee shop, each chapter reveals the backstory of a character introduced in the previous chapter through a short interaction, eventually circling around the world and back to the small Japanese coffee shop.
Lucy's Rating: