The Waiting Years: An Impression

Borrowed from J. Gossen

I don't really love coming on here and writing "reviews" for books that are technically classics. Because, I mean, who am I? I know I'm not qualified to do that. So rather, I'm writing an impression. The Waiting Years is considered a classic in Japan, which is what makes it unique to what I - as an English speaking American - would consider classic literature. So technically, it wouldn't even fall into what we call the "Western Cannon."
Lately I've been on the hunt for one of two things: proper Japanese curry and English translated Japanese fiction. Japanese restaurants in my town are a dime a dozen, but they're entirely sushi restaurants (do people not realize that they eat more than just sushi in Japan? Probably not.) and exactly one restaurant serves Japanese style curry. Alas, it's pretty expensive. And as for Japanese fiction, well I'm working on it. If anyone can recommend something written by someone other than Haruki Murakami & Kazuo Ishiguro I'd be happy to hear them. (Nothing against them, it's just that I'm certain that there are more than 2 Japanese authors out there, just as I'm certain they eat more than sushi)

The Waiting Years isn't just a Japanese classic, but a Feminist classic as well. I think the major thing I'd like to point out before I begin is that I would have benefited from reading it in a college class - though it's little it's mighty. I know there's a lot I didn't understand that I might grasp a few years from now if I ever decide to reread it. Also, I just realized a lot of people reading this are probably students, and even after I say that I'm not qualified to have any lengthy, academic discussions about this novel, there's still a good chance that someone is going to use this as help for writing a paper. Meep! I am not worthy! But all this chatter aside, I'll do my best not to let you (and your grades) down.

The Waiting Years took Fumiko Enchi eight years to write, beginning during the American occupation. This is significant because at the time, women's roles in Japan were changing radically both legally and socially. Fumiko Enchi's story is a family history taking place during a huge societal shift as Japan was in the process of modernizing.
The story, told over the course of forty years, centers around a housewife of an aristocratic man. Initially, he sends her (Tomo) out to search for a concubine for him, and she eventually brings back a quiet,15-year-old Suga under the pretense that she will act as the family's maid. Suga captures not only the heart of Yukitomo, the husband, but becomes friends with their young daughter Etsuko.
Tomo suppresses her feelings and her hurt early on. In fact, it's very rare that she ever voices her emotions. Because of Tomo's role in society, she made many sacrifices on behalf of her husband. She raises Suga as part of the family, claiming responsibility for her as if she were her own daughter. Later, Yukitomo takes on a new concubine named Yuri. Yuri and Suga become close friends. Beautifully, there isn't any of the cattiness in this household that I would have expected. But after a decade or so, Yuri leaves the house and marries, leaving Suga behind. Suga, unfortunately, will never be able to marry and have children herself because she is barren - likely due to the fact that Yukitomo took her as a lover at such a young age. A third mistress enters the scene, but this time it is genuinely scandalous as Yukitomo has a long affair with his son's wife.
While it does a great job of exploring the lives of women at the time who have little real power but emotional power, it's still very vague and short. Perhaps I'd need at least a master's in Japanese feminist literature to fully understand it. But somehow it's reminiscent of some of my favorites: Du Maurier's Rebecca, Chopin's The Awakening, The Brontë Sister's, and Grau's The House on Coliseum Street.

Adventure Time with Fionna & Cake: Double Feature

There are times when you need something fun and frivolous to read. Sometimes you need to give the ole' think-gut a rest, you know what I mean? I'd spent the last few weeks investing a lot of time reading a certain 800+ paged novel, only to have a it spoiled by a jerk friend. (There are some spoilers that just happen, and it can be forgiven. But this was a particularly asshole way to do it.) I'm pretty angry about it - I was just innocently reading and enjoying my book when this happens, and before you ask, no it wasn't Game of Thrones related. So I had to put it away (instead of just sitting around waiting for the axe to drop) and read something else to get my mind off of things.

Local Comic Store

Amazon Smile

So I opted to read some spin-offs of a cartoon franchise I really enjoy.
Even as a kid, I wasn't a fan of licensed books or series' that had too many sequels. I especially didn't trust books without a real author, feeling as if they were somehow illegitimate. But if they were part of a franchise I liked enough, I would want to give that franchise all of my money. Such is the way with Adventure Time's Fionna and Cake. I have been a fan of them since Natasha Allegri first posted her cute and very accurate comic strips on her Tumblr. I sure hope she's getting royalties from these spin-offs or something, because I'm going to continue buying anything Fionna and Cake related as long as they keep making them. Mainly on the grounds that actual episodes featuring them on the Adventure Time cartoon are rare, but also because I believe in supporting things that I think are awesome.

So, I read both the comic (at press time, there is only one volume - I don't know if there will be any more in the future) and a children's novella called "Queen of Rogues" - which was advertised as a romance novel, but there wasn't any romance to speak of.
First, the comic book. As it was helmed by Natasha herself (she did some writing and illustrating) it felt the most legitimate. At least, you get a more authentic feel of her original Fionna and Cake characters, which early on didn't seem like gender bent versions of Finn and Jake, but were their own things. Fionna and Cake are heavily influenced in both art and story by Japanese Shojo manga, which feels very natural with Natasha's art and story telling, as well as with the other artists and writers who wrote and illustrated for this comic.
The only issue I had was that the story telling was that it was a little too light, whimsical, and simplistic. (It started off brilliantly with the Flame Queen.) I remembered the original strips were really funny, though they might have been a little inappropriate too. I think the publishers were too afraid to go as dark as Cake leaving dead mice in Fionna's bed - maybe because that might be too intense for their little girl audiences. (I don't know, at that age I'd seen my cats do plenty of f**ked up things and I still like cats just fine.) I hope we do get further issues so that we can see more of Natasha's cutesy but still very wicked wit shine through.

Now for Queen of Rouge's - an obviously ghost-written franchise novella for younger readers. Actually, it was really well written and interesting. It was released with another book starring Jake the Dog and Lady Rainicorn, which was really romancey, but from what I saw of it, really stupid. This story was supposed to tell some of the background of how Fionna and Cake were introduced to Prince Bubblegum and Marshall Lee the Vampire King. I seriously doubt that any of it is cannon, but try convincing your kids that. I can see both young boys and girls enjoying this book, if you're a parent having a hard time getting your children to enjoy books.

Sleep Donation

Kindle

Sleep Donation - A novella by Karen Russel (who wrote the amazing, goose-bumping Swamplandia! and St. Lucy's Home For Girls Raised by Wolves) is only available in ebook form as far as I know. I've always been a fan fan of hers, so I swept this up as soon as I saw it on the New Releases page on my Kindle. If you've never experienced a Karen Russel story yet, you should know what you're in for. One word - Surreal. Her literary fiction is so not for everyone. I really enjoy her style and crafting of plot, but I know it might well be disturbing and unsettling to some people. Take Swamplandia! for example. It was magical - like a children's birthday magic show - campy and fun make-believe at first, until suddenly Russel pulls back the curtain, shows us her bag of tricks, reveals the ugly and brutal truth. This to me speaks volumes about her ability as a writer. She's picked the right business to go into.
I enjoy Russel's stories because I can understand why they were born. I can see how, in this story for instance, wondering about what it might be like if you physically couldn't sleep. (Though, I suppose if you're an actual insomniac you might know something about this - I, most resoundingly, am not.) I can understand being curious about it's extended toll on your health. (It reminded me of something I read as a child about Napoleon having refused to sleep a full night for a long stretch of time - only to succumb after resulting poor health.) I can definitely see how insomnia seems to be more common now, one might wonder what it might be like if it had reached epidemic status. So yes. I can understand the underlying structure of thought. It does make for an enticing fictional back-drop.

As excited as I was to read this novella, it didn't have the same spark that my beloved Swamplandia! had, but honestly I'm okay with that. What can you expect from a straight-to-ebook novella, after-all? But it wasn't bad. No, nothing that sends me straight to my dictionary is bad. She had verses that had me swooning - the concept was so interesting. But the personal drama of Trish Edgewater I found less than engaging. She wasn't a very interesting lead, though her development towards the end may have resolved those issues.
I guess in conclusion, while an interesting concept, I can't help but compare it to Swamplandia! (which is one of my all time favorite books) and it doesn't compare story wise. Or if so, it's too subtle for me to see it.

Caught in a Bad Romance: Saving Mrs. Claus

Source: Andrea B. &
Kindle eBook sharing

Remember how I said I was going to devote February - the month of Valentine's - to romance novels? Like, especially Bad ones? Well, it just so happened that my dear friend Andrea recommended and shared with me a Christmas romance novella via Kindle. I guess there is no season for awfulness. She found it on Amazon.com for free - probably because it was the Christmas holidays at time. But you know what else is free? Herpes. Luckily for you guys, now that Christmas is over, you get to pay for it!
I just want to take a little moment to mention that we live in a time when it is so easy for anyone to get their stuff out there. And that's great. The only problem is that we live in a time when it is so easy for anyone to get their stuff out there. Have no fear, fellow readers - the ebook market isn't likely to kill literature as we know it - so long as there are publishers who are willing to muck through the worst to bring us the best, we have nothing to worry about.

That said, I can't believe Andrea got me to read this. It really is as bad as you'd expect - but I'm going to be really generous and say that that's part of it's charm. In a lot of ways it reminds me of the cult classic movie Troll 2 - it's as riddled with plot-holes as a minefield is with death and distruction, the writing is so bad I'd swear that English is the author's 2nd language - either that or she sat down with a thesaurus and misused every synonym she could, and it is so blissfully unaware of it's self that it is unintentionally hilarious. This novella gave me headaches - it is a prime example of what Dorthy Parker meant when she said: "This is not a [book] to be tossed aside lightly. It should be thrown with great force."
So you can probably gather that this is a romance novel about the origins of Mrs. Claus. The way Andrea sold it to me - it's about a girl who is so obsessed with Christmas that she is destined to marry into the Santa family line. We all know people who are obsessed with Christmas - heck, I know of a girl who walked down the aisle to Christmas carols during her fall wedding. I know people who had rooms built into their renovated homes just to keep Christmas decorations. Apparently, this girl puts all of them to shame. But this is also set in the beginning of the end of the world. And there's only one way that Kris Kringle can convince her to marry her: that they can save the world together.
When focusing on what made it terrible, I keep coming back to the blessed Engrish it seemed to be written in, but there's more. There's always more. Take for example (I'm going to go ahead and spoil the story for you, okay) There's a mysterious character known as Apocalypse Boy. Apparently we're supposed to know all about this little fucker from childhood fairy tales. I mean - come on! You can't tell me you don't remember "Apocalypse Boy and the Four Horsemen"? Hm. Well, it was dark. Probably German. Did I mention the dragons? You think I'm kidding about the dragons. There be dragons. And by the way, I don't mind telling you this, but the only way that they can save the world is by having sex together. If only that's really how sex worked. 

I would grade this book A for Atrocious - it's a shame, because the concept is really cute and if it had been worked over a little more it could have improved it so much. This is why you never sell your fist drafts, people! I probably still wouldn't have picked it for myself - I'm not the most Christmassy. But, eh.

Bonus Cover Critique! Okay, for as bad as the story is, the cover isn't actually that bad. Someone dropped some serious moolah-kaboolah on the cover art. I can see how browsing along on Amazon someone might pick this out of a dozen poorly photo-shopped jobs. But as they say, don't judge a book by it's cover.