A Tale for the Time Being Ruth Ozeki

A Tale for the Time Being by Ruth Ozeki

Paperback published by Canongate 2nd June 2022

ISBN 9781838856250

In the wake of the 2011 tsunami, Ruth discovers a Hello Kitty lunchbox washed up on the shore of her beach home in British Columbia. Within it lies a diary that expresses the hopes, heartbreak and dreams of a young girl desperate for someone to understand her. Each turn of the page pulls Ruth deeper into the mystery of Nao’s life, and forever changes her in a way neither could foresee.

Weaving across continents and decades, A Tale for the Time Being is an extraordinary novel about our shared humanity and the search for home.

MY REVIEW

My biggest shout out is A Tale for the Time Being is one of those novels that grab you from the first page.

Novelist Ruth and Oliver house was overflowing with books and they loved especially old books. Ruth finds a hello Kitty lunchbox as she is walking along the beach. The letters appeared to be written in Japanese, but the red book was written in French.

Inside in the Hello Kitty lunchbox were some letters, that were mostly in English, with some Japanese characters. These letters belonged to a teenage girl, Naoko Yasutani, was called Nao, her grandmother was a nun and a novelist. The letters are quite disturbing with her thoughts for a girl in school uniform. Her parents are poor with her dad out of work, leaving California for a small Tokyo apartment in Japan.

When a tsunami hits causing devastating with many people missing, a father is searching for his six-year-old. He is looking for on the morning 11th March when the tsunami hit her red backpack with Hello Kitty on it, that she was wearing.

A Tale for the Time Being by Ruth Ozeki is honestly one of the tales I have read in a long time. Although there’s heartbreaking and moving scenes I definitely recommend book.

I would like to express how grateful I am for Canongate for sending me this book to read and review ❤️

About author Ruth Ozeki

Ruth Ozeki is a novelist, filmmaker and Zen Buddhist priest. She is the award-winning author of four novels My Year of Meats, All Over Creation, A Tale for the Time Being which was shortlisted for the 2013 Man Booker Prize and translated into 28 languages and the Book of Form and Emptiness. She has also written a short memoir. Timecode of a face. She is affiliated with the Everyday Zen Foundation and lives in Northampton, Massachusetts, where she teaches creative writing at Smith College and is the Grace Jarcho Ross 1933 Professor of Humanities.

You can find author Ruth Ozeki

https://www.ruthozeki.com/

https://www.twitter.com/ozekiland

https://www.instagram.com/ozekiland