Book to Basics #11 Kitchen by Banana Yoshimoto

Reading Banana Yoshimoto's Kitchen is like stargazing. It makes darkness, delightful.

Kitchen is such a great read. It encapsulated my ideals on how people should go through life. It gave importance to how people should continue to connect and build connections each day despite storms that may shake things up. I can't quite put my finger on it (on why and what about) but I really liked Kitchen. It was like owning a pint of good ice cream while watching the cold rain take the night. Each turn of a page gave a disarming smile, unlikely from a story which covers death/loss of a loved one. It wasn't easy to miss. Kitchen has a captivating radiance that created beauty out of pain.


"Parting and death are both terribly painful. But to keep nursing the memory of a love so great you can't believe you'll ever love again is a useless drain on a woman's energies." (p 145)


Reading Banana Yoshimoto's Kitchen reminded me of my "dark days". It reminded me of the many instances when I felt alone and fragile. Although I haven't really experienced losing someone really close to my heart, Kitchen still managed to dig dipper into my interests. It started tragic and continued to be tragic as the pages went by but it didn't rub in as melancholic. In fact, this novel about grieving and coping turned out to be an inspiring masterpiece about love and the continuing wonder of life, despite the deaths that surrounds it.


It was very easy to read. Kitchen, which is accompanied by "Moonlight Shadow" easily made its way towards my top most comforting book finds. I really liked how it played with irony. It used sadness to emphasize joy. It used death to unveil the beauty of life. "Imagination is sometimes worse than reality." (p. 64) It is a comforting pat on the back which revealed an enchanting new understanding of fear and the mysteries behind the courage and hope people can find with another person.


Kitchen (Php 588) is available at Fully Booked. For inquiries, visit their website here.

-K-

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