Restaurant of Love Regained : Ito Ogawa

Image Credit : Umami Mart

It's been a rather lazy Sunday afternoon for me. And that's how Sunday afternoons should be :-). I am reading two books concurrently - neither of which I think will end any time soon. So I thought it's time to go check the books for which I haven't written any reviews yet, and the Restaurant of Love Regained by Ito Ogawa is what came up.

I think probably I thought more of this book to review because I was in a Japanese restaurant yesterday, where I have discovered a new love for wasabi, and sushi (well, if there is such a thing that can be called vegetarian sushi, that is). Ito Ogawa's Restaurant of Love Regained is simplistic in its approach - it's an ode to food. And who doesn't like to eat good food? Those who don't know me well enough think that I am a diet fetishist who watches the calories in a deep-fried tempura with the eyes of a hawk, and weighs every decision on the basis of 'to eat or not to eat.' Ha, I say. I was attracted to this book because it promised good food. Well, vicarious pleasures are always welcome.

Returning home from work, Rinko is shocked to find that her flat is totally empty. Gone are her TV set, fridge and furniture, gone are all her kitchen tools, including the old Meiji mortar she has inherited from her grandmother and the Le Creuset casserole she has bought with her first salary. Gone, above all, is her Indian boyfriend, the maître d’ of the restaurant next door to the one she works in. She has no choice but to go back to her native village and her mother, on which she turned her back ten years ago as a fifteen-year-old girl.

There she decides to open a very special restaurant, one that serves food for only one couple every day, according to their personal tastes and wishes. A concubine rediscovers her love for life, a girl is able to conquer the heart of her lover, a surly man is transformed into a lovable gentleman – all this happens at the The Snail, the magic restaurant whose delicate food can heal any heartache and help its customers find love again 

The Independent describes this as a 'foodie fable' and I must agree. Rinko is a young woman who returns to her hometown after many years when she comes back to her apartment and finds it stripped clean by her boyfriend. She finds that that shock leaves her unable to speak, and that becomes convenient considering her uneasy relationship with her mother, who is has not kept in touch with for ten years. Her mother gives Rinko space in her house, provided she takes care of Hermes, a sow that her mother dotes on. Rinko decides that she would want to open a little restaurant with just one table. Food, she feels, is the way to solving all problems. And she prepares the kind of food based on the kind of customers who come. So, there is a different menu for a young couple who are reluctant to take the final step, another for a widow, and another for a old man. I had no problems with the novel till this point, even though I found the dialogue strangely stilted. But it's the latter half of the book that left me shocked. Puzzled. And simply shaking my head in disbelief.

A death or two and then all is changed. Rinko discovers her voice (of course, I am not giving you the spoiler, but what else do you expect?) and things settle into some hazy ending. I was disappointed. This book could have been better, but like mushrooms gone bad, it wasn't all too palatable in the end.

Verdict : What a letdown

Rating : 2.5/5

The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time : Mark Haddon

Image Credit : Adam's Bibliomania

Never judge a book by its cover or so they say. Never judge a book by what's written on the jacket, or so I say. The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time by Mark Haddon was gifted to me by Bibliojunkie last year. For some reason I cannot fathom I didn't read it till now. Or rather, I thought it was a 'mystery novel'. I can't be blamed when the blurb made me think that this is all about Christopher trying to find out who murdered the neighbor's dog, Wellington, and the terrifying consequences it leads him to. Right, I thought.

But I am in the middle of reading Ken Follett's massive Winter of the World, and since that might take the rest of the year to finish, I like taking a break from it every now and then to pick up other books. I picked this one up, and I was hooked. It wasn't a murder mystery. In fact, I don't even know how it can be called a mystery. Instead, it was one of the most captivating and creative novels I have read in years. It had me immersed, it had me smiling and it made me go 'awwww' more than once.

Christopher Boone is 15. He knows "all the countries of the world and their capital cities and every prime number up to 7,507". He has Asperger's syndrome, lives with his father and Toby, his pet rat in Swindon, his mother is dead, and his teacher Siobhan tells him to write a book. Enter what I think is one of the most original literary voices. Christopher's writing is laced with ironic humor even though he insists he doesn't understand a joke. He hates being touched, a Good Day for him is seeing 4 red cars in a row, and a Bad Day is seeing 4 yellow cars in a row. You might think that he is indifferent, or unemotional - but no. There is a lot inside Christopher's head that speaks movingly.The story opens with Christopher finding the neighbor's dog dead on the lawn, with a pitchfork in its stomach. It's a gruesome beginning. And Christopher is determined to turn detective and find out who-did-it. But that's not what the reader will care about. Through that, you discover a mess of family relations - about adults like Christopher's parents who seem to excel in completely messing up their lives. The true estrangement between his parents is what forms the crux of the book. Christopher may have 'strange' reactions to events - he hates crowded places, but I could only think that he had far more emotional sense than the others so-called adults in the book.


One of my favorite quotes: (indeed the book's chapters are all numbered prime number wise)

"Prime numbers are like life. They are very logical but you could never work out the rules, even if you spent all your time thinking about them."

Verdict : There is nothing I can add to this book that hasn't been said already. A classic.

Rating : 5/5

Left to Tell : Immaculée Ilibagiza

Image Credit : Murray Library

I don't think I have read too many memoirs of late. I used to read at least 20 memoirs or so a year during one particularly fertile reading phase. Yet, a personal account of the Rwandan holocaust was hard not to.

Immaculée Ilibagiza's Left To Tell is a harrowing account. I cannot imagine the depth of horror that she must have experienced. To imagine the human mind as capable of such atrocities. Yet, the past that she recounts is no doubt true. Her story is one of courage. Immense courage. And her story is also of faith.

As a little girl in a village in Rwanda, Immaculée was just like anyone else. She knew little of the distinction of a Hutu and Tsutsi.  Her life is torn asunder when Rwanda in 1994 plunges into genocide after the death of the then Rwandan President. Separated from her family, and her brother, who she describes as her soulmate, she spends 91 days hidden inside the bathroom of the Pastor who agrees to hide her and seven other women in his house. It's a terrifying ordeal. What sustains her through this ordeal is her faith - unswerving faith. It's this part of the autobiography that may be a bit too thick for non-religious readers. Yet, it's important to understand that considering all that Immaculée lost, faith was something that she didn't lose.

Sometimes, it's hardest to love those who hate us. And hardest to find faith in a God who seems to have turned this world into an unforgiving battle of hate. But that's what Immaculée finds solace in. I was gripped by her account. And yet humbled by her survival. There is great courage to live through what she has, but greater still to forgive those who hunted for relentlessly. I remember there were chapters in the book that I were so descriptive - Hutu Interahamwe soldiers swarmed her village, carrying machetes and ready to slash to death anyone they suspect of being a Tsutsi or even a Hutu who is a sympathizer. It was madness of the sort that the world had not seen since perhaps the Jewish holocaust.

I have one query though of Immaculée. She owed her life to the Pastor. Yet, I find that in the end, when she embarks on her journey of forgiveness, curiously there is no mention of the Pastor. It's clear that she doesn't like him because he turned her brothers away and didn't give them shelter. Yet, he showed kindness in strange ways. But I never saw in the book Immaculée reaching out to him, and thanking him. I couldn't make out what happened in the end, and this is a strange lapse in what is generally an inspiring story.

Verdict : An unforgettable account of a grim and shameful period in the world's history

Rating : 4/5

Me Before You : Jojo Moyes

Image Credit : Tumblr

I don't read romance novels. I have stayed a safe distance from the wonderful sounding new genre called 'mommy porn' that the New York Times came up with. So, it might come as a bit of surprise that I read this artfully delicious romantic read : Me Before You by Jojo Moyes.

And I confess I was surprised that I liked it so much. It wasn't remotely silly. There was wonderful wit, sarcasm, a slow and warm friendship (more than starry-eyed 'love') and the elimination of cliches that abound in romantic novels. In fact, I hesitate to call Me Before You a romantic novel. This was a book that was brimming with life and its immense scope, even as it dealt with the right to die.

Lou Clark knows lots of things. She knows how many footsteps there are between the bus stop and home. She knows she likes working in The Buttered Bun tea shop and she knows she might not love her boyfriend Patrick.

What Lou doesn't know is she's about to lose her job or that knowing what's coming is what keeps her sane.

Will Traynor knows his motorcycle accident took away his desire to live. He knows everything feels very small and rather joyless now and he knows exactly how he's going to put a stop to that.

What Will doesn't know is that Lou is about to burst into his world in a riot of colour. And neither of them knows they're going to change the other for all time.

You know the inevitable - despite all odds, Lou and Will are attracted to each other. But I admire Jojo Moyes for not sticking to a formulaic path. Will Traynor probably speaks the way I do half the time - brittle with sarcasm. And yet he has something that I don't use that much - gentleness that isn't obvious, and a fight that I admire. His fight is not formulaic either. Tied to a wheelchair as quadriplegic and dependent on others for everything, Will doesn't want to live. To me that's a fight, strange as it sounds. To understand that it's better to die than lead life the way you have envisaged it. I think I would do the same.

There is no patronizing of Will's condition here - Lou, as his caretaker tries her best to show him that life can be enjoyed - but it's not the same enjoyment for Will as before. Moyes is relentless in describing Will's resolution to die - you hate him for what he wants to do, but can't help but admire his courage in doing so. This ain't no ordinary love story. In the process, you see Will pass on a little bit of his life's learning to Lou - travel, he urges. Listen to music. Read. All of which I love to do. Yes, I am a fan of Will, even as I feel he was a bit too cold-hearted. But that's something I can easily identify with. One of my favorite lines, both Will's:

“Some mistakes... Just have greater consequences than others. But you don't have to let the result of one mistake be the thing that defines you. You, Clark, have the choice not to let that happen.”

“I see all this talent, all this...this energy and brightness and...potential. Yes. Potential. And I cannot for the life of me see how you can be content to live this tiny life. This life that will take place almost entirely within a five mile radius and contain nobody who will ever surprise you or push you or show you things that will leave your head spinning and unable to sleep at night.”

I don't recommend books easily. But this one I do. This is a poignant read. One of the best of this year.

Verdict : A warm little surprise package that is so compulsively readable. 

Rating : 5/5 (Especially for the non cliched-ending)

Africa Junction : Ginny Baily

Image Credit: Exeter

I used to write reviews of books as soon as I used to read them. But perhaps it's the end of the year and the sluggishness of watching Time move past sets in, and then the reviews-to-be-written becomes another to-do-task in your smartphone or a mind if so I possess one. So, it's a bit late that I am writing this one. And if it's the sort of book that moves out of your consciousness as soon as you keep it down, then you are in trouble, and that's where I am at - in trouble.

Africa Junction by Ginny Baily was one of those books that I picked up almost blindly, because I love reading anything about Africa. I have had this fascination for this continent - so vast, so roiled in conflict, so different, and yet so same in its humaneness. Here's the book blurb from Amazon:

Adele is in a mess. On her own with her young son, struggling to cope with her job as a teacher, and stuck in a disastrous - and dangerous - affair, her life is unravelling. The sharp contrasts and certainties she experienced during the years she spent as a child in far-off Senegal have faded to a distant blur. Then, one night, when she looks in the bathroom mirror, she sees the face of Ellena, a girl she knew in those carefree days, staring back at her from the glass.

As the daughter of a nightwatchman in exile from the brutal conflict in Liberia, Ellena's childhood was far from the idyll of Adele's memories. Her mysterious appearance sets in motion a chain of events that takes Adele back to Africa, in the hope that she can make amends for a heartless act that broke the girls' friendship and damaged Ellena's family irrevocably.

Africa Junction artfully interweaves the stories of dramatically different lives and experiences - a Senegalese boy setting sail for Europe, a Welsh teenager running from Timbuktu, a young girl escaping from a life of slave labour in Mali - but at its heart is Adele and her quest.

From the rain-drenched streets of Britain to the sun-baked reds and yellows of Senegal and the violence of Liberia's civil war, Africa Junction follows one woman's attempt to draw the threads of her life together. Out of the quagmire of violence and hardship there emerges a tentative vision of common humanity and, ultimately, the possibility both of redemption and of love.

The plot sounds promising, except that isn't the plot at all. What emerged is a rather confusing mix of stories that shift from a vague past and an equally vague present. I was really confused because I didn't realize that Adele might be white. The whole 'redemption' story that you think is the crux doesn't really emerge at all. There are a series of 'interconnected' stories (it seems to be rather the fashion  - to write of the strange interconnectedness of our lives, and how seemingly random people affect the deepest part of our lives). They were interesting in their own right, but never seem to come together to form a complete whole. You can guess from this review, that I am struggling to put together a coherent review of an incoherent story. That surprises me as Africa Junction seems to have received such rave reviews. It's just me making this out to be worse than what it probably is - but that's what I seem to do the same for much of life. ;-)

Verdict : Painful and disoriented. 

Rating: 2/5