Book Review: Days at the Morisaki Bookshop
Days at the Morisaki Bookshop by Satoshi Yagisawa, translated by Eric Ozawa, is a short little cosy book all about family, love, and the pure joy that can be found in books. It tells the story of Takako, a young woman who gives up her corporate job after a breakup and accepts an invitation by her estranged uncle to live and work in his family’s second-hand bookshop.
This book is beautifully written with only one or two moments where I felt that something didn’t quite translate well. The translation was otherwise flawless, such that I didn’t feel as though I was reading a translated book, something that is unusual. Often when I’m reading a translated book, I find there’s an awkwardness to the words or some similes that don’t quite work in English. This didn’t have that, and it was a pleasure to read and to let the words and the turns of phrase wash over me.
The Morisaki Bookshop is set in the Jimbocho neighbourhood in Tokyo and I have immediately added visiting it to my bucket list! It’s a district that dates all the way back to the Meiji era in the late 1800s and the story describes it.
“...This neighborhood has the largest concentration of secondhand bookshops in the world.”
“In the world?”
“Yeah. Because back in the Meiji era at the end of the nineteenth century and the beginning of the twentieth, the neighborhood was a center of culture, and it was loved by cultured people and writers. The reason there are so many bookstores is that they built a lot of schools in the neighborhood in that era, which meant there were suddenly all these stores selling scholarly books.”
“It goes that far back?”
“Oh yeah, and that history continues uninterrupted to the present here…”
p13
Doesn’t that make you want to visit and see that history, and all those books?
One aspect of this book that I want to draw your attention to is how the changing of the seasons and the description of the weather and the environments are used to reflect what is going on in Takako’s life. Back in high school, I hated this sort of stuff. Sometimes the curtains were just blue, you know? But in this situation, I think it was a very deliberate and, in my opinion, a very beautiful way to tell the story.
It begins in the rainy season of summer. Takako had just broken up with her boyfriend after learning that he was marrying another woman. In her depression, she slept the rainy season—her tears—away.
The rainy season had completely given way to summer while I was asleep. Above my head, the sun was glaring down at me like a teenage boy.
…
I murmured to myself, “This is a wonderland of secondhand bookshops.”
As I stood there getting broiled in the hot sun, trying to figure out how I was going to find my uncle’s store, I noticed a man looking my way, waving his hands in the air.
p9-10
At first, Takako is resistant to her new life; she never really enjoyed reading, and she continued to wallow in depression.
Slowly, however, her uncle and the regulars at the book shop bring her out of her shell. In boredom, she picks up a book and loses track of time reading it, staying up far too late. Something I instantly related to.
Things begin to improve, and the seasons reflect this.
There was one more change: I started taking walks around the neighborhood. It was right about the time when the weather had turned properly cool, the perfect season for walking around.
Day by day, the leaves along the streets turned to gold. It delighted me to see how well the changing colors matched the slow transformation happening inside me.
P36-37
Just as the leaves were changing and becoming beautiful colours, so was Takako, seeing beauty in the world around her once again.
What goes up must come down again, and an unexpected message from Takako’s ex sends her into a dour mood. And, likewise, the weather reflects this, changing to winter.
When the shop reopened after the holidays, the pain in my heart only got worse. I can’t put it into words exactly, but it was like there was this thing that was heavy and cold and it was starting to close around my heart.
…
As we sat together drinking, I told him the whole story. Outside a cold winter rain started to fall. We could hear the patter of raindrops hitting the window.
p54-55
Takako and her uncle decide to confront her ex-boyfriend, but even this is precipitated by the weather.
By the time we arrived in front of his apartment, after forty minutes in a taxi, the rain was growing more and more intense. We got drenched as we ran to the entrance without an umbrella.
p57
The meeting may not have gone as either of them planned, but it was cathartic. Finally Takako could put that hurt to rest.
In the brisk early morning air, I sensed a faint sign of the spring to come. I looked straight ahead and kept going.
p67
This marks the end of part one of the book. Takako’s arc has ended. She’s rebuilt herself after heartache and now feels ready to move out of the bookshop and restart her new life in a new apartment and with a new job. Spring, the season of new beginnings, is upon her.
The second part of the novel deals with her aunt. Takako’s Aunt Momoko left her uncle five years prior to the start of the novel, saying only she had to ‘find herself’. As such, when she returns out of the blue, taking the room above the bookshop as her own and inserting herself into Takako’s and her uncle’s life as though she had never left, there was bound to be some friction.
I admit, when the book took this sudden shift, I wasn’t particularly happy. It felt like a completely different story. Yes, the same characters were there; Takako was still the narrator, and her uncle and the regulars at the bookshop made their appearances. The weather and seasons metaphor carried through as well (I had marked all the pages this occurred, but I think I made my point with how well that worked already, no need to belabour the point). But since Takako had moved out of the bookshop, I felt somewhat removed, or distant, from the plot.
It was still enjoyable, don’t get me wrong. We learn why Momoko left and, when she unexpectedly leaves again, we see Takako rescue their relationship this time instead of just letting it happen, but I didn’t enjoy this second half as much as the first.
The final chapter of the book brought me around. It echoes the start of the novel with two beautiful opening paragraphs in the final chapter.
The Morisaki Bookshop stands alone at the corner of a street crowded with used bookstores. It’s tiny and old and really nothing much to look at. There aren’t many customers. And because it has a limited selection, people who aren’t interested in its speciality never give it a second glance.
But there are people who love this store. And as long as they’re devoted to it, then that’s enough. That’s what my uncle Satoru, the shop’s owner, always says with a smile. And I agree. Because I love the bookshop and its owner.
p143
I agree as well. This little novel is special. It was comforting and cosy, and very relatable with Takako learning to love books in the same way that I love books, and in the same way that most readers who pick it up will love books.
There is a sequel to this which I am looking forward to reading, so keep an eye out for my next book review, which will be on More Days at the Morisaki Bookshop.
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