The cover broadcasts its beauty
But,
The book doesn’t yell… It whispers soft stories… Some soothing… Some sordid… Some hopeful some hopeless… All intertwined like the aerial roots of a massive family tree.
We begin to empathise with the characters. Willing a better life for them, less hardship, more money, some comfort and a big dose of peace. As lifetimes begin and end within the covers of this book one feels age creeping up on oneself too. As young protagonists become old, one cannot help but feel the inexorable hold of time on all life.
The book starts in a small village, Yeongdo, in Korea and ends up in Japan, where many Koreans try to make their home, against all odds. The desire to be accepted and the reality of non-acceptance are two sides of the same coin there.
A book can be a repository for historical events and thereby dispense some key information on that region’s past. Pachinko clearly succeeds in that front, without making the lesson boring.
The story of three generations created by Lee has some outstanding characters, I felt my heart going out to Sunja the mighty tree who does a selfless job of providing for her family. Her sister-in-law, Kyunghee, too is a beautifully crafted character.
‘Pachinko’, was not a word I knew anything about till this book came my way… Learning more about it also paved the way for many other figures of speech that form the under belly of a nation that one knows about only superficially…
This book is definitely worth a read…Don’t wait for the weather to change and quilt to come out, to curl in bed with this one!
