A Tale for the Time Being in Book Riot's Read Harder Challenge

Feb 27, 2014 Martin rated it it was amazing

Shelves: favorites, yearofreadingwomen, 2014books

What a fascinating, lovely bunch of ideas and themes and layers packaged up as a novel. More than anything I've read in a long time this book expanded for me the possibilities of a "novel." So many meta-projects float around these days -- authors using themselves as characters in their own novels, actors playing "themselves" in pretend reality shows -- everything so self-reflexive as to be airless and devoid of contact with the world. But this is a novel that successfully pulls off all kinds of What a fascinating, lovely bunch of ideas and themes and layers packaged up as a novel. More than anything I've read in a long time this book expanded for me the possibilities of a "novel." So many meta-projects float around these days -- authors using themselves as characters in their own novels, actors playing "themselves" in pretend reality shows -- everything so self-reflexive as to be airless and devoid of contact with the world. But this is a novel that successfully pulls off all kinds of neat little meta tricks, because the tricks aren't the point. Instead, the tricks serve to connect these stories across space and time, and to explore the bizarre, cosmic ideas of identity, suicide, and life itself. No big deal. The nice thing that even as the tricks don't call any attention to themselves, neither do the vast, ultimate themes announce themselves at any point. It's a totally unfussy, elegant book that feels like it unrolls as naturally as a cartoon red carpet. (Of course, anything that feels like it develops organically and smoothly is obviously the product of an immense amount of work and skill.)

The novel is nominally two stories -- one that centers on "Ruth" (coughcough) in the present day, one the journal of Nao, a teenager in Japan. Ruth finds the journal (and some other materials...) when they wash up on her beach, and as she reads the journal she is drawn in so fully and completely that she becomes entangled -- emotionally, spiritually? -- with Nao. In actuality, the novel is many more stories than just two, as Ruth's family, Nao's family, and both's ancestors all get involved to some extent, large and small.

There's some suspense as Ruth (and the reader) worries about Nao and her family for a number of reasons, but the "plot" is very much secondary (if not tertiary or lower) to the development of the characters (all finely drawn) and the exploration of an abundance of themes. Too many themes to name here, but if it means anything as an example, this novel basically has me convinced that Zen Buddhism is the proper path to inner peace and enlightenment.

A really wonderful book that works on many many levels and is still very much rolling around in my mind. ...more

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Dec 30, 2013 Loretta rated it really liked it

Shelves: reading-for-craft

I'm torn about the rating - I did love this book in the beginning, and I adored it again for the last third, but the middle was pretty draggy, enough that it actually took me weeks to finish it and I didn't get back into it until I got on a plane and went on vacation. But mostly, overall, I loved it. I especially loved the voice of Nao, and the flipping back and forth between her story and Ruth's, and all the dharma that infuses the whole book. Just enough magic realism to make me happy. So mayb ...more

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Aug 22, 2017 Krystal rated it it was amazing

Shelves: favorites, fiction, 2017

I highly recommend this audiobook, which is read beautifully by the author

self-insertion
unreliable narrator
Zen Buddhism
quantum physics
lifespan development
cultural juxtaposition
causality

"Of all the ways to commit suicide, smoking has to be the stupidest... and the most expensive." ...more

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Jan 29, 2015 Jill rated it liked it

This seems like a great book for a person who enters books through the doorway of language. I'm a character and plot person, so I particularly struggled with the last half of this book. I wanted more about the characters of Naoko and Ruth. ...more

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