Books

IF YOU FOLLOW ME, by Malena Watrous

This month, I read three books written by Americans who taught English in Japan. If You Follow Me was the only novel; while the other two are works of nonfiction: Polly Barton's Fifty Sounds (an award-winning language memoir, which I will write a separate post on later) and Tim Anderson's Gaijin Diaries.

Like Barton's book, If You Follow Me is about a woman stationed in a remote and rural part of Japan to teach as part of the government JET program. In this case, on the remote Noto Peninsula. Despite having lived in Japan 25 years, not only did I never see this part of Japan —but never even considered seeing it (though I’ve heard it is beautiful).

Like in every part of the world, there is a big divide between the big city and the countryside and this really informs both books. Anderson, in contrast, is in Tokyo. Like Anderson's book, If You Follow Me is hilarious.

Despite the fact that the three books were very different, all three highlight the playful and quirky aspect of Japanese culture and people. Before I moved to Japan, I always pictured Japanese people how I pictured German people, serious and always on time. Rule-bound. But what I found in Japanese was a people who love to play and tell jokes and engage in all kinds of "out there" behavior (from my American point of view, of course). Watrous' book is great the way she totally illuminates this aspect of Japan. Now, relocated back in California, this is something I miss about my life and friends in Japan so it was a pleasure to read about all the antics!!

The novel is in close first-person POV and I kept having to remind myself that it was not a memoir. I loved how she presented the people she meets in Japan as fully-dimensional characters. The novel was character-driven and wonderfully done. I loved the humor and the antics. I loved how each chapter had a key Japanese term--some of which don't easily map onto English terms. It was interesting to see how the chapter captured the Japanese words.

I also loved how the young narrator was so open to the world, despite having undergone a tragedy just prior to the spontaneous move to Japan. So much of her book rang true to my own experiences, coming to Japan, also on the heels of my father's death, and finding community those first few years. I loved the Miyoshi character and wish Waltrous would write another book from his POV.

For more on playfulness, please see my essay in 3 Quarks Daily, Playing Around