Shion Miura: Kaze ga tsuyoku fuiteiru (The Wind Blows Strong)

05/05/2010, originally uploaded by nevealondra.

This is a Japanese book I recently read which was a really good story about university students who one day decide to start running long distance marathons with the aim of being selected as an university team in the Hakone Ekiden, one of the toughest marathon relays in Japan.

Hakone Ekiden is a round-trip marthon, which starts in the centre of Tokyo, goes all the way to the Hakone mountains along the coast line over 2 days – one day to climb the mountains, the second day to go down the mountain and come back to Tokyo. Each section is about 20km, run by a different athlete while the whole route is divided into 5 sections per day, so a total of 10 runners.

This book is about one college student who decides to make up a team of 10, those who happen to live in the same student apartment, train them up to compete in the prestigious race with no coach, no university support, but with the drive to win as two ex-high school marathon runners lead the team.

I think the interesting part was reading the minds of the runner and the how each student offered different things to the team. Different characters indeed make up a successful team. They grow through training, overcoming the arduous road to make it to the prestigious Hakone Ekiden.

Didn’t quite get it at the start, but then couldn’t put the book down. Pity there is no translation.

This is being made into a movie in Japan as well.

Natsuo Kirino: Out

She is my favourite Japanese author.  Her stories are nowhere near happy, usually gruesome but she describes female psychology extremely well with every detail changed for each character and the clash of these different characters in very odd ways is usually the strange mix that makes her books so engaging.

Strangely enough, I was introduced to this author through my Italian friend!  It is translated in German as well I think.

If you have never read a book by a Japanese author, I would recommend you to try her books.  But if you’re not into stories involving cutting up dead bodies do avoid this one,　and go for the more moderate ones.  This is no happy story.  Sorry I only have this in Japanese on my bookshelf…