Before I give my review on the story, the first thing I want to talk about is translated fiction. It's something I enjoy regularly, but I never really gave how much work that must go into it a second thought. Honestly, I'm really ignorant on this one. I thought it would be a Google translate job and then re-editing it so it makes sense. So I took a bit of time to educate myself on this. And the work involved is unreal. And genuinely, I'm grateful that amazing translators such as Allison Markin Powell for making novels like this one accessible to people who don't speak the language it's originally written in.
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So now the story. I loved this. It had such a sweet simplicity and innocence to it. Both Tsukiko who is quite frankly hilarious and Sensei who is definitely thinking a lot more than he is saying are characters to love. It's just so beautifully written/translated and I felt so immersed in the story. I loved how so much of the story centred around food and drink. I loved the indirectness of it.
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Naturally, that yellow cover and being set in Japan, I made comparisons to Convenience Store Woman. And oddly, I have the same feeling I had from that. Just a lovely simple tale about normal people albeit very different stories.
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I'll definitely be reading more from Kawakami.
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⭐⭐⭐⭐.5 / 5
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Thanks to @tandemcollectiveuk and @grantabooks for the #gifted copy, and to all my fellow readalong buddies who are once again tagged in the picture