In the spring of 1972, twelve-year-old Tomoko leaves her mother behind in Tokyo and boards a train alone for Ashiya, a coastal town in Japan, to stay with her aunt's family. Tomoko's aunt is an enigma and an outlier in her working-class family, and her magnificent home—and handsome, foreign husband, the president of a soft drink company—are symbols of that status. The family is just as beguiling as their mansion—Tomoko's dignified and devoted aunt, her German grandmother, and her dashing, charming uncle who confidently sits as the family's patriarch. At the center of the family is Tomoko's cousin Mina, a precocious, asthmatic girl of thirteen who draws Tomoko into an intoxicating world full of secret crushes and elaborate storytelling.
A story of first enchantments and last gasps ... Largely a book about storytelling, the conveyance it provides for unresolved emotions, and the way our futures are mapped in large part by our capacity to imagine them ... Ogawa captures the enduring spark of that imprinting and its oracular glow
Not only a compelling tale, but it is also beautifully written and constructed. The prose is clear, graceful, and engaging. Ogawa deftly weaves various motifs and themes throughout the novel.
