I kept having to pause while reading this book because it kept taking my breath away and making me want to cry.

Firstly: the writing is beautiful. We're talking lyrical, evocative, annotateable, and so delicate that you hold back from blinking to not break the spell.

Secondly, the characters are astounding. The book follows teenage Benny and his mother Annabelle after the sudden death of Kenji, Benny's father and Annabelle's husband. Their grief and distress is absolutely palpable throughout the book and left me wrecked. Benny develops symptoms suggesting schizoaffective disorder while Annabelle copes with looming unemployment, eviction, and hoarding tendencies. Their loneliness and isolation, including from each other, is heartbreaking.

A few things stood out as weird but didn't diminish my enjoyment of the novel. Thing like the clear "Marie Kondo" as well as the author herself appearing in the book were a bit too much for me, but these elements were minor compared to the stellar major ones.

I appreciated this book so much and am so glad I read it slowly. It's a book to take your time with and I recommend it widely, especially if you're into concepts of wabi sabi, enjoy reading about imperfect characters going through grief (which seems to be my thing??), and don't mind overlooking a few things that may be over the top.

More thoughts here: https://youtu.be/Wj9tTFqo-BM
And also here: https://youtu.be/ph6RGiTwc18