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The sentence: “It was strange at once to be so familiar yet so separated.” sums up this novel venry well. A novel about family, art and language. A meditative novel without much of a story. The narrator alternates thoughts about the nature of life with memories, sparse conversations with her mother and phonecalls with her sister.

A beautiful, unassuming book. The narrator Kazu lives in a camp for the homeless near Ueno station. He tells the story of his life. Born in the same year as emperor Hirohito he lived a humble life paralel to that of the emperor.

Following two blogposts of literary British literary highlights from the 20th century. I like to pay attention to a mid 19th century successful crime novel. I read this book some years ago in December.

This novel is one of my favourites, because of the splendid descriptions of nearly everything from the impressive landscape and natural surroundings, to the frequent social encounters of the many characters, which sometimes seem to lead to friendship but can also be awkward and then lead to awkward situations and to conflicts.