Kokuhaku こくはく Confessions

Kokuhaku means "confessions" in English. The Japanese has a kokuhaku culture in which the men/women confess their love/feelings to each other. If the confession cum proposal is accepted, they will officially start dating each other/be in a serious relationship!

It has been a week since I finished reading Confessions by Kanae Minato (Mandarin translation version, 告白); and until today whenever I thought of the book, I still feel really disturbed.

Confessions started off with a goodbye speech given by a teacher of a middle school, Yuko Moriguchi, who was retiring after her daughter was found dead in the pool not long ago. She later revealed that her daughter's death was not accidental, but a murder conducted by two students in her class, making them recognisable to the rest of the students without giving out their names. Before she left, she unveiled her revenge plan - taint the milk of the 2 students, Shuuya Watanabe and Naoki Shimomura, with HIV-tainted blood.

The rest of the story proceeded with different points of view given by different characters, peeling the layers one by one of a seemingly simple crime story. I thoroughly enjoyed how the story gets deeper as it goes, stories behind stories; and when there is nothing left to be uncovered, be prepared to be surprised with the conclusion.

Moriguchi-sensei decided against reporting the case to the police as the Japanese law do not punish juveniles harshly, and felt it was best to take it to her own hands. She succeeded, and very well indeed. No-one was left unaffected. Strings of bully cases, social disruption, more murders - did Moriguchi-sensei want to take revenge against the two students only, or bring everyone else down with them?

And what about justice? How much justice is enough?

The narration of the story flows really well even with different perspectives of the story told. Each page is packed with shocks and twists, making it impossible to leave the book until you reach the last page.

Minato was a housewife before she became famous with this book. I really wonder what goes on in the minds of the average Japanese.

p/s I love this review of the book!

It Started With a Fall

Image source: Amazon

"I'm not most kids. I'm Louis Drax. Stuff happens to me that shouldn't happen, like going on a picnic where you drown."

I've always liked psychological/crime thriller so when I came across Liz Jensen's "The Ninth Life of Louis Drax" at a book fair, the title just sucked me in and I knew that I need to read this book.

People say don't judge a book by its cover and boy they are right. When I saw the title, I assumed that perhaps this book is about a boy who suffered from multiple personality disorder. Maybe he was traumatised... Turns out that I was in for another kind of ride (the 'ninth' here actually refers to his age).

Louis Drax is no ordinary boy. He is bright, precocious, and dangerously, disturbingly accident prone. At eight years old, he has experienced many accidents, some major, some smaller. But during a family outing to celebrate his ninth birthday, Louis falls off a cliff into a ravine and lapses into a deep coma. He was transferred to a clinic and Dr Dannachet tries to coax him back to consciousness. But the boy defies medical logic and the good doctor is drawn deeply into the heart of Louis' buried world. Only Louis holds the key to the mystery and he can't communicate...or can he?

Personally, I think Jensen did a brilliant job in terms of storytelling. She addressed every bit of details well and it was a very engaging read. Nothing was left hanging. The excitement (and disturbing-ness) of reading the early chapters were so strong that I couldn't put down the book once I've started it.

However, as I am a big fan of this genre, I was expecting a little bit more. Or maybe I was reading from a structuralist approach? I was preoccupied with identifying the patterns and that sort of laid out the ending for me.

It's a simple book to read (not so much for kids, maybe young adults) and at some point it reminded me of Mark Haddon's "The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time". There's a couple of common elements such as parenting, problem child, pets and first person narrative (again structuralist approach!) But that's about it. They're quite different and this one moves at a faster pace.


Not revolutionary but definitely worth a read.