Monday, August 19, 2013

A Tale for the Time Being

A Tale for the Time BeingA Tale for the Time Being by Ruth Ozeki
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Wow, what a rich, luxurious tale!  There is so much in this story, I don't know where to begin.  Or end.

A woman living on an island near Vancouver finds a Ziploc bag on the beach.  The bag contains a two diaries and some letters.  As the woman reads the diary, the reader learns about the diary-writer, a Japanese girl, and the bullying and family tragedies she suffered.  This story has so many aspects and facets, and all are woven in throughout to create a smoothly flowing stream of a story.

There is Zen Buddhism here, and friendship, and bullying and wisdom, and suicidal tendencies and naked hope and quantum mechanics. There's humanity, in all of its glory and shame.  This book sucked me in like the ocean vortex, an inexorable obliteration.  I went gladly, consumed by the poetry Ozeki used to relate this story.





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