Customer Reviews

The Samurai's Garden: A Novel

5 star:		(99)
4 star:		(24)
3 star:		(9)
2 star:		(9)
1 star:		(5)

 

 

The Samurai's Garden is a soothing, hypnotic, heartbreaking, evocative book we all enjoyed. Is it the story of Stephen, a young Chinese man recovering from tuberculosis in pre-war Japan while under the care of a loyal family servant, the "samurai" of the title. The book explores cultural differences and similarities as it portrays the development of friendship and respect in disparate characters.

With sparce and simple prose, Tsukiyama depicts her principals as humans who try to be good but not perfect; as people accepting their circumstances and finding inner peace despite their flaws and mistakes.

Appropriate for all age readers, particularly young adults, we found a number of themes especially appealing: relationships, isolation/alienation and subsequent reconciliation, and the appreciation of inner beauty over physical appearance. Matsu, the "samurai," was a perfect teacher/mentor for Stephen, as he avioded putting him under a microscope, but rather served as his guide to realizing his spiritual self.

We hope you enjoy this book as ,uch as we did!

Towards the end of The Samurai's Garden by Gail Tsukiyama, Matsu one of the main characters says, "Beauty can be found in most places." And as I read this sentence, I thought no better words than beauty could be applied to this book. For sometime I have been told by many readers how much they enjoyed this book and now I wonder why it took me so long to pick up this title. Now I can only agree wholeheartedly with these readers and add my grateful appreciation to this author for writing such a wonderful book.

Beginning in prewar China, we travel with Stephen a 20 year old man recuperating from tuberculosis, to his grandfathers beach house in Japan. Isolated from his family and friends in Hong Kong and his studies at the University, Stephens sole companion in Japan is Matsu, caretaker and gardener of the beach house. At first there relationship is strained and they have little in common. But as Stephen begins to paint and Matsu works in the garden, they begin to interact with one another and eventually become the best of friends. As Matsu introduces Stephen to the surrounding villages of Tarumi and Yamaguchi, Stephen also becomes acquainted with Matsu's friends which include Sachi and Kenzo. And as Stephen becomes more familiar with them he also learns more about their lives and entanglements and we as readers are first intrigued by these three people and then become enchanted as their stories unfold. Ultimately we learn as Stephen does about life, loyalty to family and friends, betrayal, attachments but most of all unconditional love. We watch as Stephen becomes more and more ingrained in the daily lives surrounding the beach house while Japan begins to invade China and Stephen's own family is going through their own eprsoanl upheavals. All too soon, with his health restored, Stephen knows he will need to leave this solitary life at Tarumi. The approaching war and distance leaves both him and readers to wonder if he will ever see these people again.

Gail Tsukiyama has crafted a marvelous novel with layers placed upon layers to tell the story of extraordinary friendships. I found that when I read this book it was as if I was a next door neighbor to the beach hosue and priuvy to all that happened in these people's lives. And as I closed the book I had a profound sense of loneliness that my visit with them had come to an end. Although I seldom yearn for a sequel, I would love to know how life treated these characters in the future.

Gail Tsukiyama is a masterful and wondrous storyweaver. The tale of Stephen and Matsu-san is a wonderful story of life, love, acceptance, forgiveness, and the power of all living things. By the second section I was captivated by the strong and silent character Matsu-san. And as I heard the despair of Sachi-san's life, in the section of 'Spring', and the terror that she lived through, I could not keep the tears from falling. This book helped me realize so many things about myself. I find that it teaches so much as the legends of characters unfold. I will keep their stories close to my heart ALWAYS. I would reccommend this book to absolutely every person on the planet. It moved me soo much! It is not only my favorite book. It is like a sudden realization of life and what is most important in life.

The women in our book club enjoyed this book and found much to discuss. We talked about the war as a backgound as well as the differences between Chinese and Japanese cultures. We discussed the growth and maturation of the characters at length. The authors's devices and the style of her writing were talked about. As a whole, the group found this to be beautifully written and very meaningful in character portrayals. The consensus was that this is a novel of losses and gains and this phenomenon is repeatedly found in this very moving book.

Since I have been living in Japan for the past 11 years, I believe that is was easier for me to respect the style Tsukiyama uses. From most of the reviews I've read, I think most people have been too closed minded to accept it. This novel is very powerful in the themes it presents through its characters. Tsukiyama has simplyed mastered the use the the "understatement". Most American Readers may not be able to appreciate this style because they fail to see that it represents a line of thinking so prized in Japan. I believe Tsukiyama has a beautiful style that celebrates the simplistic view of life. Definetely a huge break from the busy, complicated lives most people live through in today's world. Read it and apply it to you lives.

The story of Matsu and Sachi will linger long after the last page has been turned. The power of love, friendship and forgiveness is a universal theme, one we can all relate to. The style of writing of Tsukiyama is very lyrical and understated. Some people may find this style of writing boring, but to me it was almost like reading poetry. I had a deep feeling of peacefulness after reading this book and would recommend it very highly.

I love this novel by Gail Tsukiyama. A series of revelations were unveiled at a recuperating seaside abode for Stephen who contracted tuberculosis. The adversarial circumstances surrounding his friends at the village overshadowed his illness. The novel makes me realize the fragility of life, how illness can do so much damage to a person. This thematic novel rests on friendship, love and courage; courage to live life without a complete physical self but with flaws every other person would be petrified at the very sight. It also depicts the ramifications and repercussions of war, the hatred between the Chinese and Japanese and sadly, how it affects the next generation. We ought to count our blessings! Read this novel! It will touch you just like it did to me! :)

This is a story told in diary form about a young Chinese man (a student) living in Hong Kong who, at the outset of World War II, has developed tuberculosis and is sent away to recover from the disease at his family's Japanese beach house. There he comes to know the Japanese caretaker of the house, the caretaker's female friend, and a girl who catches his fancy, people from whom we are to believe he has learned life's great lessons. The caretaker is silent, private, kind, and wise. The caretaker's friend is a once-beautiful, gentle, and loving soul, unfortunately sidelined with leprosy and confined to an inhospitable leper colony. And the girl develops a romantic interest in the young man, sealed with a kiss, despite her Japanese father's hatred of the Chinese. Noble creatures all.

From the customer reviews, The Samurai's Garden appears to be a love-it-or-hate-it kind of book, with the Love-Its weighing in overwhelmingly, if not entirely incomprehensibly: while the book is lacking in every criterion of measurement (writing, research, character development, plot) it's a sad truth that serious fiction has always engendered little public favor here, and for its writers little financial reward. (For those who have not read this book, here's a hint: the serious reviewers (the New York Times Book Review, the New York Review of Books, the Washington Post, etc.) didn't waste space and ink on this thing.)

With The Samurai's Garden, I found book meant not to enlighten but to sell. Add the book's unchallenging style, at most on the seventh-grade reading level, to its heavy dose of schmaltz, and it becomes inescapable that The Samurai's Garden was written with "best seller" twinkling before the eyes of author Tsukiyama, her agent, and her publisher.

I was under no preconceptions when I picked up this book; I wanted to like it. Sadly, it disappointed. It is so shallow that you can skate across its surface. Its wobbly premise collapses under the least scrutiny. Its characters have the attributes and the attraction of stick figures. Its dialogue is tediously juvenile. But its most grevious sin is that it is boring. The writing is so flat that it doesn't have a pulse.

One of the book's more disconcerting (if not outright funny) features is that Tsukiyama assumed that she could make the narrator (the young guy) a male, but she hasn't the ability to get inside the male head, and so for much of the time that character's aura was hermaphroditic.

In terms of poor research, the most egregious example is tuberculosis. From her depiction of TB, I could believe Tsukiyama did no research whatever, as she seems to see living through it then as an extended vacation. On such a vacation, the caretaker meets the young man on his arrival at the train station and has them (the young guy schlepping his suitcases) jogging several miles to the beach house (had the wheel not come to Japan?), and later has the two of them jogging to the leper colony. This is crazy. In fact, TB was one of the leading causes of death during the time period in which the book was set. It had no medicinal cure. Rest -- not marching about -- was crucial to the patient's recovery. TB is highly contagious, is airborne, and spreads rapidly in enclosed spaces. The patient becomes very sick. He is febrile, loses weight, has night sweats, and is crushed by constant fatigue. You get none of this from Tsukiyama. A person with active TB is a serious health menace. That Tsukiyama should have him visit lepers whose immunity is already compromised (!), and for her to have him kiss the uninfected girlfriend (!) is grotesquely irresponsible.

There is more. The story's possibilities lie in the ethereal vapor of unrealized hopes. Tsukiyama had the path open to explore differences in Chinese and Japanese cultures, but she didn't. She could have examined what the war meant to the Chinese and the Japanese, but she didn't. She could have enearthed the complexities of the Oriental servant-master relationship, but that was another missed opportunity, as was why the young man had the bizarre notion that the beach house really belonged to the the Japanese caretaker.

"The most engaging powers of an author," said Thackery, "are to make new things familiar, and familiar things new." Of all of Tsukiyama's missed opportunities, the blue ribbon must go to her failure to heed this. It would have been lovely to experience the sights, smells, and energy that abounded in Hong Kong and at the Japanese seaside at that time, and how war affected the lives of those affected.

It has been claimed that Tsukiyama writes clean, pure lines, which are of a piece of Oriental art. Well, for that matter, the Dick and Jane stories have clean, pure lines. I suspect that the clean, pure lines here are aimed at a targeted best-seller readership.

Reviews of the Samurai's Garden seem to fall into two camps. The "Oh my God, I loved it-best book evers" and the "Are you kidding me? This book stunk category!"

My problem with those in the latter category is that (with a few exceptions) readers who did not like this book tend to mount some moral literary high horse. They relish insulting other reviewers, as in "Anyone with any discerning taste and one scintilla of brain cells would NEVER like this book, ergo if you do you, I hate to break this to you, but you are a stupid, simple, idiot." Listen to yourselves! I wonder what it must feel like to these people to know everything?

Anyway. I did not particularly love this book, but I really can see how many did. The case can definitely be made that there were many layers of beautiful, intertwining lessons in this seemingly simple, yet really more-complex-than-it-looks book. In that sense, it kind of reminds me of the polarizing effect of the Ladies' Detective Agency series by Alexander McCall Smith.

My biggest problem with this book was that I don't think I was in the mood for it. I read it at a time when I had a lot going on, and couldn't sufficiently savor it. This is a book to be savored in peace. For most of my read of it, I wasn't in a peaceful frame of mind as a reader. My personal restlessness wanted more action, less bean cake eating. A few times, however, despite myself, I was caught flat-footed with awe by something in the story. The one thing I took away was to never forget that everyone has a story that helps define them. You just have to be still and listen.

The Samurai's Garden - Gail Tsukiyama

A young Chinese man comes to Japan to recuperate from tuberculosis in THE SAMURAI'S GARDEN, a beautiful book written by Gail Tsukiyama filled with wonderful images and poetic prose that paints a gentle backdrop of rural Japan before the start of World War II.

Stephen has grown up in Hong Kong and lives most of the year there, but in the late 1930's he comes to Japan to stay at his family's summer residence to get away from the humidity and heat. It is his parents' hope that the cooler drier climate may help clear up his tuberculosis and improve his health.

Stephen comes to the ocean-side town of Tarumi, expecting the worse. He is not happy that he is being sent away from home. However, he adjusts to his new way of life, learning to love the solitude and peaceful life that their housekeeper Matsu has led for nearly all his life. Through Matsu, Stephen learns to appreciate a different way of life, and finds that he enjoys being in Japan and learning about the people in the town of Tarumi, and in the nearby mountain town of Yamaguchi, where Matsu's dear friend Sachi lives. He spends his days painting or taking walks along the beach or visiting with Matsu and his friends.

Stephen also befriends one of the local girls, Keiko, who is closer to his age than Matsu or Sachi are, and they develop a relationship that is rather tenuous throughout it's entire existence because of the war between their two countries.

In the meantime, the Japanese Imperial army has captured many key cities in China and are slowly making their way south, heading towards Hong Kong. Stephen feels the tension around him, as he himself is an outsider and is considered the enemy by those who know he is Chinese. On the other hand, Stephen learns that despite the fact that he is living with the Japanese, he loves his new friends and does not want this war to come between them.

Gail Tsukiyama's story of Stephen and his experiences during his year in Japan is no more than a series of observations and reflections of a young man viewing life through a new set of eyes. Written in the form of a journal, THE SAMURAI'S GARDEN lacks a strong plotline and doesn't have much action. However, it is made up by the beautiful prose and commentaries that form the thoughts of young Stephen as he discovers love of a young woman in a foreign land, love of friends, and love of a foreign country that he will never forget. Having already read DREAMING WATER, THE SAMURAI'S GARDEN was another wonderful treat and I am looking forward to reading yet another novel by this author.