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61st out of 145 books
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The Pearl Diver
In 1948, a nineteen-year-old pearl diver's dreams of spending her life combing the waters of Japan’s Inland Sea are shattered when she discovers she has leprosy. By law, she is exiled to an island leprosarium, where she is stripped of her dignity and instructed to forget her past. Her name is erased from her family records, and she is forced to select a new one. To the two...more
Paperback, 256 pages
Published
December 18th 2007
by Anchor
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Author: Jeff Talarigo
Title: The Pearl Diver
Genre: Historical fiction
Publication Info: DoubleDay. New York. 2004.
Recommended Age: 14 and up
Plot Summary: A 19-year-old Japanese girl who dives for pearls to help her family with the cost of living is diagnosed with leprosy. It is 1948, and she knows that she will be cast out of society if she is found with such a disease. She hides out in a shed by the water for a couple of days, but the local authorities find her...more
Title: The Pearl Diver
Genre: Historical fiction
Publication Info: DoubleDay. New York. 2004.
Recommended Age: 14 and up
Plot Summary: A 19-year-old Japanese girl who dives for pearls to help her family with the cost of living is diagnosed with leprosy. It is 1948, and she knows that she will be cast out of society if she is found with such a disease. She hides out in a shed by the water for a couple of days, but the local authorities find her...more
This is now one of my favorite books ever - what a stunning story!
This is the story of a 19-year old girl. She is a pearl diver in Japan. She develops leprosy and is cast out from her family, her job, and her future to an island with other lepers.
I learned a great deal about leprosy that I did not know. This book also made me think about how fear controls our actions. It made me grateful for my simple life and the freedoms I take for granted every day.
My only criticism of the book is the author's use of "Artifacts" to pr...more
I learned a great deal about leprosy that I did not know. This book also made me think about how fear controls our actions. It made me grateful for my simple life and the freedoms I take for granted every day.
My only criticism of the book is the author's use of "Artifacts" to pr...more
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The story is of a young woman, nineteen years of age, who is a pearl diver. Even this aspect of the story I found fascinating; the author describes very well the lifestyle of a pearl diver in the days when it was still done without special equipement. Even in the 40's, which is when this book begins, pearls were harvested in much the same way they must have been for centuries. The girl learns that she has leprosy, and the rest of the book is set in a leprosorium on an island, which has no concta...more
People like to blame misfortune on its victims. When a sore on a young pearl diver’s arm is diagnosed as leprosy, she is chased down, declared dead, and confined to a small island populated by thousands of other patients. She stays there the rest of her life.
Miss Fuji, the pearl diver, meets her life’s trials –estrangement from her family, conflict with island administrators, personal doubt- with resignation. The treatment for the physical symptoms of her disease is available from th...more
Miss Fuji, the pearl diver, meets her life’s trials –estrangement from her family, conflict with island administrators, personal doubt- with resignation. The treatment for the physical symptoms of her disease is available from th...more
This was a quick read - I was able to finish it in an evening. The first half of the book was the strongest, but it began to taper off in the second half. By the end, the authorial voice was much stronger than the character herself. In-fact, my main criticism of the book is that the pearl diver, Miss Fuji, is not as well developed as the protagonist of a story should be. She is a sympathetic character, certainly, but the author fails to paint a really vivid picture of either Miss Fuji or those a...more
The story of a girl who spends her life on an island in Japan where she's been quarantined because she has leprosy.
The unfairness of the situation is what struck me the most. Throughout the telling, there are snippets of information about the health administration's response to changes in the treatment of leprosy. While patients could have been repatriated without worry of spreading infection, they were still held away from society.
While the island residents could suc...more
The unfairness of the situation is what struck me the most. Throughout the telling, there are snippets of information about the health administration's response to changes in the treatment of leprosy. While patients could have been repatriated without worry of spreading infection, they were still held away from society.
While the island residents could suc...more
I normally don't read historical fiction. I loved the cover of The Pearl Diver, so I decided to give it a try...I am so glad that I did!
The story takes place in Japan and starts out in the year 1938. You are introduced to the world of pearl diving...and a 19 year old girl who is just starting to get comfortable with pearl diving and with her co-divers. She is suddenly taken ill with leprosy, and shunned by her family and friends. She makes the journey to the island of Nagashima, where ...more
The story takes place in Japan and starts out in the year 1938. You are introduced to the world of pearl diving...and a 19 year old girl who is just starting to get comfortable with pearl diving and with her co-divers. She is suddenly taken ill with leprosy, and shunned by her family and friends. She makes the journey to the island of Nagashima, where ...more
This is a beautiful little book, and I loved it. The story begins with a young pearl diver in Japan in the 1940's, she loves the diving, the sea and everything about her chosen career. But it is all stripped from her when she discovers she has leprosy, and she is taken from all that she knows and loves and is put into isolation on an island for leprosy patients. She is told to forget her past life, it is now dead to her, and her life begins the day she sets foot in the leprosarium.
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To be a leprosy patient in 1940s Japan meant to be a societal outcast, quarantined on an island leprosarium with others afflicted with the disease. Jeff Talarigo gives a voice to Miss Fuji, Mr. Shitayama, Miss Min, Mr. Nagame, and his other characters; the voice that their society had long denied them. Thru a series of anecdotes, each introduced by the description of a catalogued artifact from the leprosarium, we glimpse their daily lives, experience the strength of human spirit that triumphs in...more
This book is exactly why I love libraries and librarians! It was recommended to me by one of my local librarians. It was a book that I would not normally pick up but, since my daughter read the Samurai's Garden for summer reading, which also deals with leprosy, I decided to pick it up. I am so glad I did. The writing is absolutely amazing. It is lyrical while dealing with an intense subject. (Hard to do!!) there is an eloquence to the spare writing that draws you in. The characters are w...more
A very good, easy read. I belive this is my first book about leprosy. Very well written. I was able to get a great visual of the place, people and emotions portrayed by the author. This books stirs in me the desire to learn more about the topic---that's a good book (for me)
A quote that I want to remember---"Words are the most important thing we have. A few words, one word, can change history. Inagine that the correct words had been chosen by those people who are in...our ...more
A quote that I want to remember---"Words are the most important thing we have. A few words, one word, can change history. Inagine that the correct words had been chosen by those people who are in...our ...more
I cannot say that I loved this book--it was very sad and depressing and I felt like I discovered a deeply hidden and unfortunate side of Japanese society--how people with leprosy were isolated from society and poorly treated. Of course, this was not only done in Japan--but elsewhere in the world as well--people were afraid of a disease that they believed to be highly contagious and incurable. I was shocked by how the patients were disowned by their families and the patients themselves were blame...more
I really enjoyed this sweet and yet sad little book. My sister recommended it to me for an easy read. It's a sad story about a Japanese woman's life with leprosy. I enjoyed reading about the Japanese culture, although the way the lepers were treated (basically disowned from their families and banish from their communities) is very sad. I also enjoyed the relationships portrayed between the fellow lepers. Although leprosy is a very sad disease, the book also serves as educational, teaching t...more
While the prose of this novel are excellent and the structure original, the story is one of overwhelming sadness, and I was glad when I was finished. The story is set in post-war Japan and spans 40 + decades of the life of a 19-year old pearl diver who is diagnosed with leprosy and is exiled to a leper colony on a small island not far from where she grew up (she can see her hometown island from her new home, Nagashima). She must change her name and takes on “Miss Fuji” for the island she climbe...more
So I actually didn't finish the book. I got about half way through and encountered the most graphic, disturbing, account of somebody going through a forced late term abortion in the 1950s in a Japanese leprosy camp. It was an interesting book up until this point, but I didn't have the stomach to finish it. I suppose I could have just skipped this part, but I had a hunch that there would be more atrocities that would be equally as apalling. Not my idea of a Christmas vacation read!
I "read" the audio version and was kind of disappointed. I thought the reader didn't really emote very well and seemed to not read with the right emotion. I thought the way each chapter began was interesting - an artifact was listed, then the story behind the artifact followed it. All in all, it is a sad story of how lepers were segregated from society and particularly about one young girl whose whole life and freedom are wrenched away from her due to the disease. I think in this ca...more
I would have rated this book higher, except that I don't "love" books which make me cry. This is a very moving book, beginning at the end of WWII, about a young pearl diver who develops leprosy. She is taken to an island, where she is made to give herself a new name. Her family is dishonored and she no longer has contact. She works with other patients and makes friends; she is punished for swimming to the next island just to observe other people.
I have come to love these historic fiction books that give me such insight into an era I had no understanding of. The Pearl Diver definitely has some intensity that is hard to take. And the style of story telling is very hard to get used to--my 7 minute sessions of reading don't work well with something so disjointed. But the story inspired me to count my blessings and quit whining so much. And I enjoyed Miss Fuji and her friends very much.
This was a really lovely book - I loved the way the story was written. I liked the historical aspect and I learned a lot about leprosy and how it was handled although the story could certainly be translated to any number of conditions/diseases where society lets ignorance rule by shunning the afflicted. A deep-feeling book where the author lead me to think about what the characters were really feeling. Thanks so much for sharing this book!
i love this book. a touching and haunting novel about the dichotomy of humanity - how respect, and -ill use a buddhist term, lovingkindness, can stem from a place of outcast, misery, sadness, cruelity, and ignorance...i highly recommend it - its a quick read. this was actually a re-read for me (i read it when it first came out years ago) as i noticed the author has a new book...see my comments on that book too.
The pacing of this book reminded me of other books I've read by Asian authors. "Kitchen" by Banana Yoshimoto comes to mind. There is something about the way these authors describe things that seems similar. Perhaps it's a language thing? A culture thing? Both books have characters that are frustrated youth trying to figure out where they fit into social structure.
The last book I read with a main character with leprosy (I know, odd, but I just remembered this) was the first...more
The last book I read with a main character with leprosy (I know, odd, but I just remembered this) was the first...more
The writing in this book was not as lyrical and haunting as it was in Jeff Talarigo's second novel, The Ginseng Hunter, but I enjoyed it just the same. A sad story filled with details about the life of a nineteen-year-old girl, a pearl diver, who is sent to the Nagashima Leprosarium when she discovers she has the disease. I liked the way Talarigo uses artifacts from the period as an introductory device for each chapter. A solid read; readers who liked Molokai and The Colony will enjoy this book.
Iejones
marked it as to-read
I started this sooooooooo long ago - I know that I will have to go back - however, this title falls in-line with my usual fascination - history and humanity. This time in post-World War II Japan where people dive for pearls - however, one diver becomes afflicted with leprosy - and is exiled to an leprosarium -- on a secluded island -- I hope to finish it - any inspiration is appreciated.
Dev
rated it
Thoughtful and thought provoking, this book gives an even-toned yet deeply passionate look at the plight of lepers in Japan from the end of World War II through the 1980s. In spite of its nakedly frank look at poverty, racism, bureaucracy, casual and spiteful brutality, ignorance, death, and the rape of Japanese culture by Western influence, the book has a soft and dreamy, feel to it. I've learned about pearl diving in traditional Japan, the response of the world health community to the introd...more
Ok, I didn't actually "read" this one, I listened to it on CD. It was not at all what I expected. I really enjoyed it as a very personal take on a historical time and how the Japanese people and government dealt with leporasy. It reminded me of an island I've heard about off the coast of Kauai, Hawaii and would be interested to compare the two places.
This was fascinating, finding out how people with leprosy were treated back 70, 80 years ago, and how it has progressed to better care for the patients. I've always been interested in this disease ever since I knew there was an island in Hawaii that was dedicated to leprosy victims many years ago.
This was about a young girl that at 16 was a pearl diver and then find out she had leprosy and tried to hide out until they found her and banned her to the island for Leprosy. This took plac...more
This was about a young girl that at 16 was a pearl diver and then find out she had leprosy and tried to hide out until they found her and banned her to the island for Leprosy. This took plac...more
In 1948 a 19 year old Japanese pearl diver is in her fourth season of her profession. She discovers she has leprosy and is rejected by her family and sent into exile on the island of Nagashima. There she is basically an inmate in a leprosarium. The characters are dehumanized yet maintain the best parts of themselves.
This book was a little sad for me. I hate how we've treated people in some of our past history. But I loved how the main character of this book accepted her role, and spent her whole life trying to help others live comfortably. And I especially like that in the end, we saw that she did make a difference.
I am completely haunted by this novel.
I read it years ago and yet I find myself thinking of it often.
I am haunted by this young woman's experience of isolation and desire to connect. I can still picture her waving to others from her prison of an island and swimming in the safety of night.
Beautiful.
I read it years ago and yet I find myself thinking of it often.
I am haunted by this young woman's experience of isolation and desire to connect. I can still picture her waving to others from her prison of an island and swimming in the safety of night.
Beautiful.
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