Tokyo Ueno Station - bookrastinating.com

Unabridged, Length: 3 hours 58 minutes, Narrator: Johnny Heller

English language

Published June 23, 2020 by Penguin Random House Audio Publishing Group.

ISBN:: 978-0-593-21125-0

A surreal, devastating story of a homeless ghost who haunts one of Tokyo's busiest train stations.

Kazu is dead. Born in Fukushima in 1933, the same year as the Japanese Emperor, his life is tied by a series of coincidences to the Imperial family and has been shaped at every turn by modern Japanese history. But his life story is also marked by bad luck, and now, in death, he is unable to rest, doomed to haunt the park near Ueno Station in Tokyo.

Kazu's life in the city began and ended in that park; he arrived there to work as a laborer in the preparations for the 1964 Tokyo Olympics and ended his days living in the vast homeless village in the park, traumatized by the destruction of the 2011 tsunami and shattered by the announcement of the 2020 Olympics.

Through Kazu's eyes, we see daily …

A surreal, devastating story of a homeless ghost who haunts one of Tokyo's busiest train stations.

Kazu is dead. Born in Fukushima in 1933, the same year as the Japanese Emperor, his life is tied by a series of coincidences to the Imperial family and has been shaped at every turn by modern Japanese history. But his life story is also marked by bad luck, and now, in death, he is unable to rest, doomed to haunt the park near Ueno Station in Tokyo.

Kazu's life in the city began and ended in that park; he arrived there to work as a laborer in the preparations for the 1964 Tokyo Olympics and ended his days living in the vast homeless village in the park, traumatized by the destruction of the 2011 tsunami and shattered by the announcement of the 2020 Olympics.

Through Kazu's eyes, we see daily life in Tokyo buzz around him and learn the intimate details of his personal story, how loss and society's inequalities and constrictions spiraled towards this ghostly fate, with moments of beauty and grace just out of reach. A powerful masterwork from one of Japan's most brilliant outsider writers, Tokyo Ueno Station is a book for our times and a look into a marginalized existence in a shiny global megapolis.

3 editions

PeterB reviewed Tokyo Ueno Station by Miri Yu

Review of 'Tokyo Ueno Station' on 'Goodreads'

3 stars

Tokyo Ueno Station is the story of Kazu. At the same time, it is also the story about the Ueno station park that houses many homeless people.

I think it paints an interesting (and depressing) picture of being homeless and how Japan deals with this crisis. These sections really touched me.

The story of Kazu however, was not really my cup of tea. Although it is well written, it's a struggle from one bad event to the next one and felt a bit contrived in some parts.

I did like the many references to Japanese culture and history. It was really lovely to learn a bit more about the history of Japan.

Overall, this is a good book that I would especially recommend to any one interested in learning a bit more about Japanese culture that you may not learn about in the average tourist guide.

peter

rated it

Feb. 2, 2021