This is a book I have read many, many times in the past, its a haunting novella focused around the Japanese tea ceremony and of a man who gets involved with his dead fathers mistress and the shadow of his fathers previous long term mistress hovers over him constantly. A very tragic novella and one where the past weighs heavily on the present.

Despite the bleakness of his works, I have yet to read a Yasunari Kawabata book that I did not like. His books are my gateway to Japanese literature in general. They are ones I come back to yearly especially this one and Snow Country. I do have five of his translated works yet to read, and I should get around to them soon. The Scarlet Gang of Asakusa, The Lake, The Old Capital, The Rainbow and Dandelions. I also want to read The Sound of the Mountain and The Master of Go again, having only read those once.

I notice this book is also newly re-published here (UK) as one of the 90 new Penguin Archive books. All short stories or novellas re-released with a beautiful minimalist new cover.

This makes it 10 books for the year so far, I was tempted to increase my years target to 50 but I think for now I will keep it at 25. I have plans for some longer books which I may get bogged down in.

Happy Easter.