Top Ten Tuesday: Books I Have Read by Japanese Authors

 

Welcome to this week's edition of Top Ten Tuesday which is hosted by That Artsy Reader Girl. This week's them

e is Top Ten Quick Reads/Books to Read When Time is Short (Books under 150 pages, or if you’re not a novella reader maybe spin this to be books you could read in a day or a single sitting.) (Submitted by Jennifer @ FunkNFiction.com and Angela @ Reading Frenzy)

As I am participating in The Japanese Literature Challenge I am going to twist the topic this week and share ten books by Japanese authors that I have read. Many of these book actually would qualify as pretty quick reads.

Before the Coffee Gets Cold by Toshikazu Kawaguchi - This is the first book in the Before the Coffee Gets Cold series. I am currently listening to the third book in the series. (my review)

Sweet Bean Paste by Durian Sukegawa - I really loved this book, and then watched the movie adaptation as well (my review)

The Great Passage by Shion Miura - A fun book about the creation of a dictionary

What You Are Looking for is in the Library by Michiko Aoyama - This was the last book I read for the Japanese Literature Challenge.

The Kazogawa Food Detectives by Hisashi Kashiwai - This was a lot of fun (my review)

Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro - I had to go back many years to find this book! I think I read this for a bookclub back in the day.

Kitchen by Banana Yashimoto - I liked this one but still haven't read any more from Banana Yashimoto

Hotel Iris by Yoko Ogawa - I must say I don't remember a lot about this book!

The Restaurant of Love Regained by Ito Ogawa - (my review)

Butter by Asako Yuzuki - I just saw this on Netgalley and requested this straight away! I plan to read it this month! 

Top Ten Tuesday: Bookish Jobs

 

Welcome to this week's edition of Top Ten Tuesday which is hosted by That Artsy Reader Girl. This week's theme is 

Bookish Jobs I Would Do For Free (Real or Imaginary) (Submitted by Susan @ Bloggin’ bout Books)

Book Lovers by Emily Henry - This book features a literary agent and an editor!

The Bookbinder of Jericho by Pip Williams - This is set in an Oxford printer where the main characters starts as a bookbinder.

The Bookstore Sisters by Alice Hoffman  - A short story set in a bookstore

Elodie's Library of Second Chances by Rebecca Raisin - Elodie leaves her job in publishing and becomes a librarian in a small town

The Great Passage by Shion Miura - This is about the creation of a dictionary

Beach Read by Emily Henry - Two writers end up living next to each other for a summer

The Women's Pages by Victoria Purman - The main character in this book is an early war journalist

Aria's Travelling Bookshop by Rebecca Raisin - A travelling bookstore owner!

The Bookshop on the Shore by Jenny Colgan - Or on the shores of a Scottish lake

The Little Paris Bookshop by Nina George - Or Paris. Le sigh!

Did any of these books appear on your list?

Six Degrees of Separation: Passages to Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus

 

Welcome to this month's edition of Six Degrees of Separation, which is a monthly meme hosted by Kate from Books Are My Favourite and Best.  The idea is to start with a specific book and make a series of links from one book to the next using whatever link you can find and see where you end up after six links.  I am also linking this post up with The Sunday Salon, hosted by Deb at Readerbuzz. 

 

This month's starting point is book called Passages by Gail Sheehy. Apparently this was a very popular self help book in the 1970s.

My first link is using the word passages. Great Passages by Shion Miura is about the creation of a dictionary, and is set in Japan.

I thought about choosing a book with great in the title, but instead chose Before the Coffee Gets Cold by Toshikazu Kawaguchi  which is also set in Japan, this time in a cafe in Tokyo.

I did think about trying to do a whole chain set in Japan, but decided against it. Instead I am choosing another book set in a cafe - Midnight at the Blackbird Cafe by Heather Webber

I have no shortage of books that feature cafes or restaurants, but instead I am chose to link using the word birds. The book I chose is Mateship with Birds by Carrie Tiffany.

One thing that Aussies pride themselves on, rightly or wrongly,  is the idea of mateship. Much of the ideal of this comes from the Australian campaign at Gallipolli in WWI. Thomas Keneally's book, The Daughters of Mars tells the story of a nurse during that campaign.

I don't often try to go full circle with Six Degrees, but this time I think I have managed it. We started with a self help books from the 70s. Let's finish with another one, this time from the 90's. Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus by John Gray was everywhere back in the day.

I found the starting point this month quite easy and had done a couple of other full chains before deciding on this one.

Next month's starting point is an autobiography, Born to Run by Bruce Springsteen. 

Where did your chain take you this month?

Top Ten Tuesday: Fancy fonts

 

 

Welcome to this week's edition of Top Ten Tuesday which is hosted by That Artsy Reader Girl. This 

week the theme is

Typographic Book Covers (Book covers with a design that is all or mostly all words. You can also choose to do books with nice typography if that’s easier!) (Submitted by Mareli @ Elza Reads)


It is interesting when you look at trends in covers. If we look at historical romance as an example. Not too long ago most covers were clinch covers with women in gorgeous dresses but these days it isn't as standard. Now, there are font covers or cartoonny in amongst the big dresses.


I haven't focussed on just one genre, but here is my Top Ten Tuesday post featuring typographic book covers.

One for the Money by Janet Evanovich - The reality is that you could have picked any one of the Stephanie Plum books as they are pretty much all typographic covers!

Love Stories by Trent Dalton - Given that this is a selection of very short stories, this cover makes sense as there isn't one single story to tell

Someone I Used to Know by Paige Toon - Plenty of rom-coms have wordy covers!

The Year the Maps Changed by Danielle Binks - This cover is very eye catching.

The Great Passage by Shion Miura - This book is all about the words, inside and out!



The People We Meet on Vacation by Emily Henry - All of Emily Henry's covers have been wordy so far.

Red White and Royal Blue by Casey McQuiston - Such a fun cover and book!

Normal People by Sally Rooney - Quite a few of the covers for this book have bold typography on the cover.

Don't You Forget About Me - Another author who has a lot of these style of covers.

Me Before You by Jojo Moyes - This cover does not convey the emotional nature of this book at all!

Do you like typographic covers?

Top Ten Tuesday: Bookish ....

 

Welcome to this week's edition of Top Ten Tuesday which is hosted by That Artsy Reader Girl. This week the topic is Bookish Characters (these could be readers, writers, authors, librarians, professors, etc.)

Here are my choices, which re possibly more accurately described as bookish books or having bookish characters.

The Lincoln Highway by Amor Towles - One of the central threads in the book revolve around a book called "Professor Abacus Abernathe's Compendium of Heroes, Adventurers and Other Intrepid Travellers" that the youngest character in book carries around with him everywhere he goes

Chai Time at Cinnamon Gardens by Shankari Chandran - This book is all about the life stories of these characters and how the past continues to shape us. One of the key characters also moonlights as an author, albeit under a pen name.

The Beautiful Words by Vanessa McCausland - Another ode to words and books, with an author as one of the main characters.

Cloud Cuckoo Land by Anthony Doerr - Doerr brings us mutliple stories, all connected through one fable

The Winter Sea by Susanna Kearsley - When an author finds herself living in a cottage in Scotland, the voices of the historical characters from her story come to life (and another excuse to sneak a Kearsley book into a TTT post!)

The Great Passage by Shion Miura - A nice story telling about the creation of a dictionary.

Beach Read by Emily Henry - Two authors who write in different genres end up living next door to each other.

The Tolstoy Estate by Steven Conte - During WWII, the German army use Tolstoy's country house as a base.

Aria's Travelling Bookshop by Rebecca Raisin - Books and France! Yes please.

The Bookshop on the Shore by Jenny Colgan - Books and Scotland. Yes please!

What books did you have on your list this week.