Nor did I expect an education in Hansen’s Disease, aka “Leprosy.” Before reading this book I knew only that it featured in an episode of Call the Midwife and that, back in the day, Queen Elizabeth beat Princess Diana by decades in shaking hands, gloveless, with a patient of a fear disease. I did not expect to be so moved by this little book! Wow, it packs quite an emotional punch. “The only way to get over barriers…is to live in the spirit of already being over them.”(p.
“I made all those sweet things for all those who lived with the sadness of loss.” (p.202) In spite of her crippled hands and her advanced age, Sentaro agrees to hire her. She keeps asking–finally bringing a Tupperware bowl full of the sweet bean paste she’s been making for 50 years. Then one day an elderly woman, Tokue, asks him to let her make the sweet bean paste. His life is dull, he has debt, and nothing changes. Released from prison for a routine drug offense, Sentaro has been working in a very small pastry shop selling pancakes filled with sweet bean paste.
It doesn’t matter that I was never a teacher or a member of the workforce, my life had meaning.”(p. “I began to understand that we were born in order to see and listen to the world. This book fits the criteria of both and I do not see a problem with crediting it to both challenges since they are only for fun. Translated into English for the first time, Durian Sukegawa's beautiful prose is capturing hearts all over the world.I’ve enjoyed most of the Japanese literature I’ve read in the last few years, so this year I signed up for the Japanese Literature Challenge and the Year of the Asian Challenge. Sweet Bean Paste is a moving novel about the burden of the past and the redemptive power of friendship. She begins to teach him her craft, but as their friendship flourishes, social pressures become impossible to escape and Tokue's dark secret is revealed, Tokue makes the best sweet bean paste Sentaro has ever tasted. With only the blossoming of the cherry trees to mark the passing of time, he spends his days in a tiny confectionery shop selling dorayaki, a type of pancake filled with sweet bean paste.But everything is about to change.Into his life comes Tokue, an elderly woman with disfigured hands and a troubled past. He has a criminal record, drinks too much, and his dream of becoming a writer is just a distant memory. I Love You A charming tale of friendship, love and loneliness in contemporary Japan Sentaro has failed. 'I'm in story heaven with this book.' Cecelia Ahern, author of P.S.
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