The first book by a Japanese author I ever read was Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and His Years of Pilgrimage by Haruki Murakami (no surprise, I guess). A friend recommended it to me one day while we were browsing in a library near my workplace. I picked up the French translation — the cover featured a white silhouette of a man, with colorful lines expanding behind him. It turned out to be a life-changing discovery — not just of a great author, Haruki Murakami, but also of a genre I hadn’t explored much before: magical realism. The book read smoothly, never feeling simplistic or boring. The characters were magical, the setting dreamy — long story short: I loved it.

As soon as I finished it, I rushed back to the bookstore to find more of Murakami’s books. My second read was Kafka on the Shore, and to this day, it’s still my favorite Murakami — though I haven’t read everything he’s written yet. It took me some time before I started exploring other Japanese authors. I’m not sure if that’s a good thing or a bad thing, but I tend to be (very) loyal to the authors or artists I love. For example, I remember when I was younger, it took me a while to listen to anything other than Michael Jackson’s songs — and the same thing happened with horror books; I stuck with Stephen King for a long time before reading anyone else.

The first time I betrayed Murakami with another Japanese author was when I read Snow Country by Yasunari Kawabata (1968 Nobel Prize in Literature ) But since it’s a classic (1948 and published in english 1956), I don’t really count it as a true betrayal. The real one came later — with Toshikazu Kawaguchi’s well-known book Before the Coffee Gets Cold. And to be fair, it only happened after I had read twelve Murakami books in a row… so I think he’d understand.

 

As for Korean authors — to be honest, my first read was pretty recent. It was Welcome to the Hyunam-dong Bookshop by Bo-Reum Hwang. I really enjoyed it, and it made my dream of opening my own bookshop grow even stronger.

Now, I’ve actually started it with Books and Kukkii. I’m excited to read more from Korean authors!