A Book where Real Life Magic might Happen
Yes, you read the title right 😃 The book that i’ll share today will make you wonder that, Magic, in the era of digital and smartphone, might really happen!
The answer is all in the book written by Keigo Higashino, one of my favorite author, titled The Miracles of Namiya General Store. Even though it was first published on 2012 in Japan, it’s international version just published in 2019 through Yen On. After seeing it every time I opened Kindle store, last April, I finally purchased it, and it only took me around 2 days to devour all the 320 pages, because it’s just THAT GOOD!
Short Summary :
The story started in Namiya General store around the ‘70s. Because the name “Namiya” was often misspelled as “Nayami” which means problem, neighborhood children prank Mr. Namiya by treating his store as a “problem solver store”. They often visited the store to ask a very childish question like, “how to get higher grade without studying” and so on. But, rather than angry, Namiya thought it was hilarious and tend to the question seriously and give the best answer to the children’s problems. It continually happen, that the question Namiya got increase in number and the tension, now he gets serious question too, about romance, economy, and people’s life in general. To protected the animosity of his “clients”, he invented a unique systems, where his “clients” can drop a letter in front if his store after store closed (around 8 pm), and get the answer in milk crate next morning before the store opened (around 8.30 am).
It all sound makes sense, until you realize that this store can not open forever, as you know Namiya is old enough at that time. This is where the magic happens, as years later some people visited the store, and tried to inserted their letter thru the mail slot despite the dark store. This time, the letter transcend the universe and travel the time, received by 3 young men.
“My mother always told me that if you don’t understand something, don’t assume people owe you an explanation—try to figure it out yourself.”
Why should you read this book?
🌀 Strong Plot - The deeper you dig through the pages, you will find that everything is connected, and the ending sealed the plot very very well, that may be for some of you it’s harder to finish the book, but I really suggest you keep going. Because the ending gives a perfect satisfaction, a Closure if you will :))
✍🏻 Smooth Writing - One of the reason Higashino is in my fav list, because his descriptive writing style. It’s really clean and smooth, not rambling all over the places. It’s shown very well too in this book.
✉️ Powerful message - As the characters tried to solve their problem, we’re also pushed to reflect, “what will we do if we’re on their shoes'“ kind of message. And I really love with these characters it’s displayed very well that a visually a same problem might weight different in different people, how can we judge so easily?
Perhaps some consideration, you should also notice :
🎢 The theme might be not cup of your tea, it’s a fiction, fantasy, mystery, magical realism, contemporary, and cultural, all fit in this one book. But once you pushed forward, I’m optimist you will not be disappointed.
🎭 The number of characters is quite a lot. I suggest that you keep note, or if sometimes forget who is this character again, please don’t hesitate to check back pages before. It’s important to get maximum satisfying impact in the end, like i mentioned on the Plot section 😊
The movie adaptation has been released too, Nov 2017. You can check the trailer below ⬇️