January 15, 2015

Time  11.00 a.m. to 12.15 p.m.

Residence of:  Nisha Dobberstein

THE COMMONER

Our literary odyssey shifts to Japan with a novel written by John Burnham Schwartz, an American author with a deep interest in Japan. This fascinating story is a fictionalized biography of the current Empress of Japan.

 “The true story on which the novel is based is well known. In 1957, the Japanese crown prince, Akihito, met a beautiful young woman, Michiko Shoda, on a tennis court. She became the first commoner to marry into the imperial family. …Out of this heart-wrenching history, Schwartz has woven a delicate, elegiac tale, intensely moving and utterly convincing. He has imaginatively reconstructed the private story while remaining largely true to the scant details that have been reported to the public…” wrote Lesley Downer in “The New York Times”.

*Book for February:         The Four Aleys, by Renu Balakrishnan

*Book for March:              The Voice Inside My Head or Infidel in Paradise by Susan Laidlaw

*Note: these book discussion groups will be author-led

Vidya Srinivas                                                           Elizabeth Milne