
Books Nov 15, 2014
As the holiday season rolls around, it's time to dash about in a mad panic in search of gifts that say "I've given this one some thought, honest." Or you can just let us do the thinking for you, with gift suggestions from our ...
As the holiday season rolls around, it's time to dash about in a mad panic in search of gifts that say "I've given this one some thought, honest." Or you can just let us do the thinking for you, with gift suggestions from our ...
Finding Murakami in his own weird worlds
Consider this hypothetical conundrum: Haruki Murakami is (finally) awarded the Nobel Prize in literature, but what does the author have to say for himself on Japanese television? The Forbidden Worlds of Haruki Murakami, by Matthew Carl ...
This is one of those books you read to the last page without ever finishing; you keep going back for more — and finding it. Strange, strange characters, these Zen men! What to make of their weird utterances? "(A) master, holding up his staff, says: ...
Sake and sakura can be a dangerous combination. Drunk on both, English teacher Will Ferguson made a bet that he could hitchhike the length of Japan, from the southernmost tip in Cape Sata to the northernmost in Cape Soya, while following the cherry blossom ...
The author known as Takasue's Daughter, or Lady Sarashina, kept a diary to mark her bold 11th-century journey from the east of Japan to the capital. So enthralled did she become with writing that she continued for 40 more years, producing an account that ...
Spooky tales from beyond the grave
Ghost stories are universal, but Japanese ghost stories, argues Zack Davisson in "Yurei: The Japanese Ghost," are unique. So much so that Davisson, a translator and essayist who is something of a specialist in the supernatural, uses yūrei, the Japanese word for spook, throughout ...
The phrase oyatoi gaikokujin refers to foreigners hired by the Meiji Era government and various educational institutions to impart their skills to Japanese eager to advance in the modern world. The Great Wave, by Christopher Benfey.Random House, Nonfiction. ...
The first known Japanese in Hawaii were shipwrecked fishermen circa 1806, unwitting forerunners of a diaspora they can scarcely have imagined. From Race to Ethnicity, by Jonathan Y. Okamura.University of Hawaii Press, Nonfiction. In 1868 ...
What Do You Want to Create Today?
Tokyo resident Dr. Bob Tobin chose the title for "What Do You Want to Create Today?" to make his message entirely clear: It's all about you. What Do You Want to Create Today?, by Dr. Bob Tobin.BenBella Books, Nonfiction. ...
How KonMari's phenomenal book can help put your house in order
Before wrapping up my interview with Marie Kondo, who might well be world's foremost cleaning consultant, I promised I would put one of her de-cluttering lessons to the test prior to reviewing her book "The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up." And so here I ...
Tei: A Memoir of the End of War and Beginning of Peace
Tei Fujiwara's book is a historical memoir of one woman's journey to save her family. The year is 1945 and the Soviets have declared war on Japan. Fujiwara is forced to leave her home in Manchuria, a Japanese-controlled state in China, to flee the ...
Read up on books about books about Japan
Revving up the metabolism of culture with the pulse of new artistic voices, a good literary journal doesn't usually have much to do with profit — it's all about circulation. Japanese literary journals enjoy a healthy transmission here, thanks to the financial backing of ...