FOL sale! TBR

From the front cover:

"Affectionate and convincing... idiosyncratic and lyrical... full of accurate insights." -- The New York Times Book Review

THE LADY AND THE MONK
FOUR SEASONS IN KYOTO
PICO IYER
AUTHOR OF VIDEO NIGHT IN KATHMANDU

From the back cover:

TRAVEL/ADVENTURE

"A beautifully written book about someone looking for ancient dreams in a strange modern place." -- Los Angeles Times Book Review

When Pico Iyer decided to go to Kyoto and live in a monastery, he did so to learn about Zen Buddhism from the inside, to get to know Kyoto, one of the loveliest old cities in the world, and to find out something about Japanese culture today -- not the world of businessmen and production lines, but the traditional world of changing seasons and the silence of temples, of the images woven through literature, of the lunar Japan that still lives on behind the rising sun of geopolitical power.

All this he did. And then he met Sachiko.

Vivacious, attractive, thoroughly educated, speaking English enthusiastically if eccentrically, the wife of a Japanese "salaryman" who seldom left the office before 10 P.M., Sachiko was as conversant with tea ceremony and classical Japanese literature as with rock music, Goethe, and Vivaldi. With the lightness of touch that made Video Night in Kathmandu so captivating, Pico Iyer fashions from their relationship a marvelously ironic yet heartfelt book that is at once a portrait of cross-cultural infatuation -- and misunderstanding -- and a delightfully fresh way of seeing both the old Japan and the very new.

"[Iyer] is a sharp-eyed and thoughtful observer, and he is successful in evoking the life of Kyoto's malls, temples, and back streets, moonlit nights on the water, and the vulgarity of the Westernized nightclub and amusement quarter." -- New Yorker

"Pico Iyer's remarkable talent is enough justification for going anywhere in the world he fancies." -- Washington Post Book World

*sigh* I think I'm going to give up on this one. I first pulled it off the shelf and started it months ago, in preparation for our trip to Japan... and promptly got bogged down and abandoned it. Took it with us on the trip, hauled it all over Japan for 3 weeks, and restarted it on the plane ride back home, hoping that actually having been to Kyoto might help... I'm sure it's a good book, lots of other folks have LOVED it, but for some reason I just can't connect with this author and his style doesn't manage to hold my interest. Changing status to Available; hopefully it will find a more appreciative next reader.

Reserved for jennannej, who won this in my International RABCK Contest on BookObsessed.

Mailed today - enjoy!

It's been a few years since I was last in Kyoto, but I'm looking forward to reading this book sent to me in a big ol' box of books sent by nwpassage. Thanks so much! (Currently in Bryce Canyon National Park in southwest Utah.)

This book brought be back to my visit to Japan several years back. Japan is such a land of contrasts. I plan to send this to another friend, who has spent some time in Japan.

CONTROLLED RELEASE NOTES:

Sending off to a friend in Nebraska!