Lizard, by Banana Yoshimoto
Six lovely stories
(Review posted 6 Feb 2005 22:22:56)

This is another of those books where I want to tell you to stop reading my reviews and just go off and get the book and read it.

Six lovely short stories, about mostly young people living mostly in modern Tokyo, and love and longing and sorrow and joy. Told in light and luminous prose, frank and unselfconscious.

The only thing that scares me is time passing, like when the soft branches of a willow tree are warmed by the sunlight one moment and then ripped by a typhoon the next. As when the cherry blossoms bloom, only to fall to the ground. That this moment will end, with the warm orange sunlight streaming in onto Akira, as he lies curled up, watching his video, and night will come. That is the saddest thing to me.

"Let's go have soba at Chojuan," Arika said.

"Sounds great," I agreed. I would go out with Akira and forget, for a brief while, the sorrow that clings to life. I would pretend for a moment that my sadness might someday disappear.

(I don't know if that sounds melodramatic out of context; I hope not. There's no melodrama here.)

This edition (Washington Square Press trade paperback, 1996) has two afterwards by the author, which are as clear and unpretensious as the stories themselves. You really should read this book.