A review by kaatelin
A Tale for the Time Being by Ruth Ozeki

3.5



i liked how the book explored some aspects of time and the impact on the reader on the story, but i felt like it dove too deep too few times so it didn’t feel like a really consistent motif


My favourite section of this book easily was Nao’s time with her great grandmother, it was atmospheric, and considering Nao and her great grandma are the only character who felt really flushed out to me, it felt like such a well developed part of the story. I also just love all her prayers and the relationship built between the two of them. It was the one clear and believable moment of hope in the novel

Ruth is really there to represent us as the reader, but I also felt a bit mislead by this idea of Ruth as a sort of detective trying to figure out Nao’s story. I think there was little more I got out of the story by having her as this sort of facilitator of discovery. In some ways I wish I was first hand experiencing it, with Nao talking to me, or even it could be an interesting opportunity to use a second person voice to pull the reader in even more beyond Nao’s direct calls to the reader/Ruth. 
—> after checking out the print version it does some interesting things with footnotes! Most are just translations but a few are Ruth questioning Nao’s narrative, which does a good job as positioning Ruth as an investigative force in the story! The appendixes did nothing for me though

I am glad Ruth’s husband called her out for her bullshit about being worried about Nao as an “urgent issue” but also reading the journal so slowly!! And naming that the timing was so unclear, how did she not thing earlier that the journal was many years old!!

I also just did not care for Ruth’s side of the story!! See narrative development reasons above, but also everyone in that story was either boring or part of this rotating cast on the island who each got one moment of importance


Certain points of this book just got too much for me, Nao’s bathroom attack in particular as well as her “dates”. They really soured the story for me and the redemption only happened when she went to be by her great grandmother.
take all the content warnings at face value, because Nao does not sugar coat or glance over anything.  She’s got a clear narrative voice and it’s a blunt one. 

I don’t love how we had to spell out some things, like having Ruth and her husband state clearly Haruki One and Haruki Two’s motivations for their actions and directly drawing a parallel. I kind of want the author to trust the reader a bit more. It also felt like everything had to be justified - I’m not sure it added more to the story to me to learn that Nao’s dad had this other motive behind his firing and his suicidality



I seem to have a lot of thoughts on this book!! I’ll edit and add more if I think of anything else, but overall despite the more mediocre rating, it did really catch my attention and I got through it fairly quickly!!


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