pres.umptuo.us

The Five People You Meet in Heaven

The title already lead me to think of some cheesy uplifting story, but I had my hopes that it wouldn’t be all that bad. I was hoping for the wrong thing.

I found this book to be way overrated, and not something I would recommend to anyone. The plot and the way it’s written is well-done though, in that it made me keep reading it, and sure enough I finished it in two days.

But the message, and ultimately the reason for reading any book, just made me say, “Duh.” The book’s title should really be “How to Live Life to its Fullest for Dummies.”

No-No Boy

Victor recommended No-No Boy by John Okada to me after he had read A Wild Sheep Chase on my recommendation. I expected this book to have some aspects of Murakami in it, but it ended up being far from it.

No-No Boy follows the main character Ichiro, who is a Japanese American, or “Nisei,” shortly after he is released from prison for refusing the draft during WWII. Because of this, other Japanese-Americans hate him for not being American enough, but his mother and other Japanese immigrants respect him for being Japanese. Ichiro has to live with the decision he has made, and through the course of the book questions if society can overcome racism and nationalism.

There is some really good stuff in here, and while it moves a bit slow in the beginning and Okada isn’t the greatest of writers, it really pays off. While reading the afterword I realized No-No Boy is a book about Asian-Americans written by an Asian-American. Wow, finally an Asian-American story that isn’t a total copy of Amy Tan or Maxine Hong Kingston’s “My controlling parents are the root of all of my troubles” storyline.

I would highly recommend this book to anyone out there, as its subject matter and message ring very true in today’s world.