Scan barcode
maketeaa's reviews
208 reviews
Before Your Memory Fades by Toshikazu Kawaguchi
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
third installment of a series which, as it goes along, becomes clearer and clearer that reflecting on the past is good as long as it helps us move forward in the future. through the stories of a young woman who feels abandoned and wishes to meet her dead parents when she was a baby, a comedian who wishes to show his dead wife that he won a comedy contest before he takes his own life, an older sister suffering from severe anxiety after her younger's sister's death going to see her one last time, and a young employee at the café returning to visit 'the one that got away' before she leaves for america, the resounding message is that we don't know what the future holds for us, but, just like yayoi's mother wanted to see the future she desired, we, too, can create our own future. however, with the theme of death still running through the book, it's evident that the future itself may not be what we desired either way. nanako, despite reiji's hope to marry her in the future, still passes away . but what is important is to have hope, hope to fuel yourself to keep going, to see whether that next day will come, to fight for the feeling that a promise of better days gives you.
i liked the overall message of this one but the change of location and new characters felt a little confusing. found it hard to feel as invested as the last installment!! but still very sweet and enjoyable
i liked the overall message of this one but the change of location and new characters felt a little confusing. found it hard to feel as invested as the last installment!! but still very sweet and enjoyable
Tales from the Café by Toshikazu Kawaguchi
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.5
"if you try to find happiness after this, then this child will have put those seventy days towards making you happy. in that case, its life has meaning."
i thought, at first, that maybe the rest of this series would just be a repetition of the original book, that it would just be a reiteration of the lesson that the past is something to make peace with rather than change, and while this story was an extension of that, it certainly wasn't a redunant collection of stories. in 'tales from the café', kawaguchi takes a closer look at death and bereavement, expanding on the final story from the café between kei and miki and the message of wishing happiness for miki beyond the grave. we meet a man wishing to meet his dead best friend, whose young daughter he adopted after his death, a son wishing to meet his dead mother while he himself considered suicide, a lover wishing to meet his old girlfriend after he passed away from cancer, and an old detective wishing to pass on a birthday present to his wife after she was murdered twenty-two years ago. throughout, we see miki, the widowed nagare's young daughter, bringing light and life into the café, symbolising new beginnings and rebirths through the excitement of a seven-year-old, in her songs about spring and her ever-changing phases, and kazu, who we learn is the daughter of the ghost in the chair. all the former characters share one thing in common -- a desire to hold onto the past, to punish oneself for their loved one's death, and an inability to dig themselves out of their bereavement. going back to the past, for them, means going back to make amends, to do what they believe will absolve them of their guilt -- for the man and his best friend, it is to take a video revealing to his daughter that he is not her real father, for the son, it is to turn himself into a ghost after the death of his mother, for the lover, to make sure she is happy in the future, and for the husband, to pass on the present. but what each character learns that it is not necessary to make amends, to 'fix' anything to absolve them from their guilt -- the best way to give meaning to each death is to continue life in a way to make themselves happy. the time that the person they have lost spent in their lives is time that was spent with love, and thus, instead of using their legacy to live in sorrow, they should live with the memory of the joy they felt to experience being alive at the same time as them. a truly touching second installment to a very sweet series❤️
Before the Coffee Gets Cold by Toshikazu Kawaguchi
emotional
reflective
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
genuinely one of those books that just feels like a warm hug. funiculi funicula is the perfect set for a time travelling café: underground, lit by old-fashioned lamps, with no phone signal, and only a smattering of customers at a time. the urban legend says that patrons can time travel, but there are rules attached -- they must stay seated in the specific chair to travel through, they cannot change the present from the past, and they must return before the coffee gets cold, lest they turn into a ghost. in this smattering of customers, we peer inside their hearts to see what they would use their singular chance to travel through time for, what is is that means to them enough to experience one last time without being able to change the present.
what we learn is that, while we can't change the present from the past, we can choose to do things differently. we can re-evaluate how we imagine our memories -- both past and future -- and change how we behave to be happier. every character travels to a different time in order to receive some kind of truth that they crave, some kind of curiosity to be sated, and while nothing substantial changes in their reality, their expansion of awareness changes their life itself.
and i think what's also quite poignant is that, for each person, the people they wanted to meet in the past (or future) loved them very much. fears of resentment, of abandonment, of anger against them turned out not to be true at all. i guess it's just a very sweet reminder that things are never as bad as we think they are, or will be.
such a sweet and emotional book! i definitely teared up in the last conversation between kei and miki.
what we learn is that, while we can't change the present from the past, we can choose to do things differently. we can re-evaluate how we imagine our memories -- both past and future -- and change how we behave to be happier. every character travels to a different time in order to receive some kind of truth that they crave, some kind of curiosity to be sated, and while nothing substantial changes in their reality, their expansion of awareness changes their life itself.
and i think what's also quite poignant is that, for each person, the people they wanted to meet in the past (or future) loved them very much. fears of resentment, of abandonment, of anger against them turned out not to be true at all. i guess it's just a very sweet reminder that things are never as bad as we think they are, or will be.
such a sweet and emotional book! i definitely teared up in the last conversation between kei and miki.
A Little Life by Hanya Yanagihara
emotional
sad
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
i hestitated to pick this up because i've definitely heard some interesting opinions about it, to say the least. i've heard people say it's one of those books that are sad for no reason, that pile on the trauma just for the shock value. and, while on one hand, i can see where opinions like this come from, i can't disagree more. the sadness is there for a purpose. maybe not in a way that the characters can see, but in the way that we can see -- the purpose of showing us that no matter how much meaningless sadness, the unfairness of pain we have in our lives, the people who love us will always try to fight for us to stay alive, and, at the same time, how this fight may, at the end of the day, be for nothing, and yet it doesn't stop us from fighting. yanagihara explores friendship, love, and devotion, the decision to keep loving someone, the decision to make someone 'less sick' if they can't make them get better. heartbreaking in the futility of efforts, in the decades-lasting scars from experiences jude had no control over, in the complications in all his relationships, the people who want him to stay, and the trauma in him that makes it so hard to stay, we see that loving people isn't necessarily about how easy it is to be with them, but about how much we are willing to try.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Suicide, Child abuse, Rape, Grief, Self harm, and Suicide attempt
Moderate: Addiction, Drug abuse, and Eating disorder
Eat the Heart of the Infidel: The Harrowing of Nigeria and the Rise of Boko Haram by Andrew Walker
challenging
informative
slow-paced
4.0
four stars in terms of content. but the commentary of said content... hm.
i think this is incredibly well-researched and very, very detailed. walker takes us through the historical landscape of northern nigeria, the petridish in which boko haram was cultivated. from the early political divisions between the fulani and hausa people, to the first colonial excursions, and the christianising and subsequent secularisation that came with it. we see the fallout of this, the fear of losing one's indigenous identity leading to a banding together of northern nigerian muslims against the threat of losing their perceived right to being subject to sharia law, and the anger against democracy across the rest of nigeria. then, he shows us what he describes as the 'crisis of epistemology', giving examples of how grassroots politicians are nowadays elected on the basis of personal favours because people lack trust in them to make substantial changes, the aspect of 'godfathers' between government members, and the manner in which communication and journalistic reporting does not always provide a clear-cut answer to the questions of the populace. overall, his thesis is that there is so little we know of boko haram and why boko haram continues to proliferate because of the lack of transparency there is, because there are so many conflicting claims and perspectives which seem to be pushed based on each ethnic group, religious group, or political party's agenda. he gives the example of stephen davis, one of the only people who managed to talk to boko haram and try to negotiate for the chibok girls, only for them to be taken back by the group before they could be rescued due to the delays in the rescue team.
and i think it IS valuable to take a look at the layers in nigeria's conmunication system making so many of these things confusing and opaque. but there were certain times where the author sounded like he was some travel writer venturing into the depths of the Politically Fraught Africa, you know? i'm thinking specifically of a line where he was watching disputes sprout among a crowd exiting a political meeting and simply ended the passage with 'i stood back and watched'. like? make the commentary, sure, but treating an entire nation like it's characterised entirely by 'chaotic idiocy' (THOSE WERE HIS WORDS) is just very bad taste imo. at least from someone who is NOT nigerian themselves.
anyway, regardless, still a very informative book. i do certainly have some gripes about the reductive way he sometimes referred to islamic beliefs but that's a whole other story.
i think this is incredibly well-researched and very, very detailed. walker takes us through the historical landscape of northern nigeria, the petridish in which boko haram was cultivated. from the early political divisions between the fulani and hausa people, to the first colonial excursions, and the christianising and subsequent secularisation that came with it. we see the fallout of this, the fear of losing one's indigenous identity leading to a banding together of northern nigerian muslims against the threat of losing their perceived right to being subject to sharia law, and the anger against democracy across the rest of nigeria. then, he shows us what he describes as the 'crisis of epistemology', giving examples of how grassroots politicians are nowadays elected on the basis of personal favours because people lack trust in them to make substantial changes, the aspect of 'godfathers' between government members, and the manner in which communication and journalistic reporting does not always provide a clear-cut answer to the questions of the populace. overall, his thesis is that there is so little we know of boko haram and why boko haram continues to proliferate because of the lack of transparency there is, because there are so many conflicting claims and perspectives which seem to be pushed based on each ethnic group, religious group, or political party's agenda. he gives the example of stephen davis, one of the only people who managed to talk to boko haram and try to negotiate for the chibok girls, only for them to be taken back by the group before they could be rescued due to the delays in the rescue team.
and i think it IS valuable to take a look at the layers in nigeria's conmunication system making so many of these things confusing and opaque. but there were certain times where the author sounded like he was some travel writer venturing into the depths of the Politically Fraught Africa, you know? i'm thinking specifically of a line where he was watching disputes sprout among a crowd exiting a political meeting and simply ended the passage with 'i stood back and watched'. like? make the commentary, sure, but treating an entire nation like it's characterised entirely by 'chaotic idiocy' (THOSE WERE HIS WORDS) is just very bad taste imo. at least from someone who is NOT nigerian themselves.
anyway, regardless, still a very informative book. i do certainly have some gripes about the reductive way he sometimes referred to islamic beliefs but that's a whole other story.
Hiroshima Nagasaki: The Real Story of the Atomic Bombings and Their Aftermath by Paul Ham
challenging
dark
slow-paced
4.75
reads like a dystopian horror. the alternating point of views, the immersive descriptions, the contrast of political meetings in polished buildings to the utter desecration of two cities is like a punch in the gut. paul ham masterfully organises a detailed, analytical recount of the atom bombings of hiroshima and nagasaki in a way that picks apart all the wool drawn over the world's eyes and makes the cataclysms for what they truly were -- the senseless killings of hundreds and thousands of people. he leaves no question about it: the atom bomb was not necessary for the end of the war. and most importantly: the people of hiroshima and nagasaki were failed, time and time again. a harrowing story of racial hatred, western propaganda, and the military excuses made for purely political moves, which ends with the conclusion that holding onto nucleur weapons is simply a waiting game of when a repeat of this will happen.
also, wasn't sure how to add this into the main body of the review: what really got me was the moral reasoning the west tried to use. 'we must be the only ones with access to nucleur bombs because we are determined to keep the peace' *nukes two entire cities for no fucking reason*. great example of how america is one huge gaslighting monolith
also, wasn't sure how to add this into the main body of the review: what really got me was the moral reasoning the west tried to use. 'we must be the only ones with access to nucleur bombs because we are determined to keep the peace' *nukes two entire cities for no fucking reason*. great example of how america is one huge gaslighting monolith
Hiroshima by John Hersey
challenging
dark
informative
sad
slow-paced
5.0
five stars because of what this work is. there is something so powerful about a 30,000-word piece on an american atrocity published through an entire issue of the new york times. especially when that piece is the kind of piece that hersey has created -- something personal, real, vivid, taking an audience who had been hearing about the glory of the atom bomb into the core of that glory, into the lives desecrated in a way that's worse than a horror movie. it gave me chills imagining being one of those american readers, reading about the impact of the bomb in such a frighteningly human way. you hear a lot of hiroshima nowadays, but it's sometimes hard to fathom what living through it must have been like. this is the exact account to put oneself in that nightmare -- the flash of white light had just been the beginning.
Shake Hands with the Devil: The Failure of Humanity in Rwanda by Roméo Dallaire
challenging
dark
informative
slow-paced
4.25
a mammoth x-ray into the united nations and the logistics behind peacekeeping operations in the context of rwanda. dallaire takes us through the web of the UNAMIR mission that has been pulled apart by the world following the genocide, and shows us exactly all the factors there were in the play. he skimps on no detail, bringing to the forefront every interaction, every aggressor, every moment that tied the hands of the peacekeepers a little tighter that prevented them from saving any of the 800,000 lives lost. he shines a light on the shocking lack of care the UN, particularly the united states and france, had for actual humanitarian aid, and raises the question of whether UN intervention is truly based on saving lives or rather acts like the PR department for the west. he circles back to the important point that as an international community we must stop acting as though some lives are more important than others, that the sentiment of 10 american soldiers' deaths being equal to 800,000 rwandans deaths must not persist when trying to help upheaval across the east-west border.
my only gripe throughout the book, and i honestly hesitated a little to add this because of how it sounds, is that i dont think dallaire did as good of a job as he says in the conclusion of focusing on what could be done better to not have a repeat of rwanda, at least not through the meat of the book. like i said, this is a lengthy, detailed work, but i felt like there were points where details were being added simply for the shock factor. yes, the horrors of what happened should not be ignored, but i wonder whether at some point that the descriptions extend past being used to frame the main point of the failures of the response to the genocide and instead skirts the territory of gore and trauma porn.
regardless, a very informative and harrowing read.
my only gripe throughout the book, and i honestly hesitated a little to add this because of how it sounds, is that i dont think dallaire did as good of a job as he says in the conclusion of focusing on what could be done better to not have a repeat of rwanda, at least not through the meat of the book. like i said, this is a lengthy, detailed work, but i felt like there were points where details were being added simply for the shock factor. yes, the horrors of what happened should not be ignored, but i wonder whether at some point that the descriptions extend past being used to frame the main point of the failures of the response to the genocide and instead skirts the territory of gore and trauma porn.
regardless, a very informative and harrowing read.
The Power by Naomi Alderman
challenging
dark
mysterious
tense
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
a very interesting commentary on marginalisation and brings into question the reasons we are often given to justify why our social order is the way that it is. alderman demonstrates to us how, often, the political landscape and distribution of power we take as innate in the world often arises almost as an accident, as a sequence of events that eventually creates a perfect breeding ground for public figures to sow their seeds and profit from the tensions between the groups beneath them. i think what really interested me was what felt almost like a racialisation of gender, and how a lot of the narrative reflected patterns of genocide -- in particular the justifications given at the beginning for killing men, to make them pay for their 'previous sins', similar to how genocides often occur as a result of one group who perceives themselves to be oppressed against the other. i think this racialisation and the rhetoric that cropped up to further separate men and women to justify their power gap (and in the case of men, brutalisation) was itself a very smart thing to do, because not only does it say something about how arbitrary the sexist stereotypes we live with are, but also how dangerous racial stereotypes and separation can become. overall, this is a very interesting look at power and the dangers of this power becoming instititionalised, but, most importantly, how this power can be made to seem normal to us through a careful shifting of lenses of our ways of understanding the world -- religion, history, and law.
i guess my only gripe is just a personal taste one: i wish it didnt read so... YA-y sometimes? some of the action scenes just felt a little unnecessary and i would've been way more interested if the focus had been more on the sociological aspects rather than that.
i guess my only gripe is just a personal taste one: i wish it didnt read so... YA-y sometimes? some of the action scenes just felt a little unnecessary and i would've been way more interested if the focus had been more on the sociological aspects rather than that.