May Book Club – A Tale for the Time Being

Posted on May 9, 2013 in Uncategorized

This month’s bookclub choice was A Tale for the Time Being by Ruth Ozeki and it was met by mixed reviews. A tale of one teenage girl in Tokyo and one middle-aged woman in British Columbia this is one story spanning thousands of miles and highlights the peaks and troughs of humanity. The most wonderful thing about this story is how people can be connected through writing and yet never meet – something which is bound to appeal to us publishing folk!

“Print is predictable and impersonal, conveying information in a mechanical transaction with the reader’s eye. Handwriting, by contrast, resists the eye, reveals its meaning slowly, and is as intimate as skin.”
― Ruth Ozeki, A Tale for the Time Being

A Tale for the Time Being is both tragic and philosophical, but not to worry, there are uplifting moments in this book that reaffirm the reader’s faith in the author (my own faith in her did wobble at times).

The overall consensus was that this novel is a worthy read but it is not one that we would have plucked off the shelves without encouragement. Two worlds collide as popular Japanese culture clashes with the gentle and rural lives of the inhabitants of a remote coastal town in British Columbia. The novel itself is divided into two narratives portraying the first person thoughts of Nao, a Japanese teenager who is wise beyond her years, and the third person narrative of Ruth ( a fictional representative of the author Ruth Ozeki). The pace of both narratives is also challenging as one is fierce and fast-paced (Nao’s) and the other is meandering and often off-topic (Ruth’s) much like the Pacific gyres that are often described in the novel. Such gyres are also responsible for washing Nao’s diary up on Ruth’s beach (it’s all rather neat and poetic).

Pick this book up if you are ready to be thrust into the heady lights of Tokyo and tugged into the woods of rural Canada but perhaps take your time reading it as it does deserve to have your full attention. With endnotes, appendixes and a thorough glossary, you will feel a great sense of satisfaction when you reach the end (and it is worth getting to the end I promise!)