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Recommendations based on The Lakeby Banana Yoshimoto
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Kitchen
by Banana Yoshimoto
A young woman's journey of self-discovery and healing, exploring the kitchen of her dreams.
From Mikage's love of kitchens to her job as a culinary teacher's assistant to the multiple scenes in which food is merely present, Kitchen is a short window into the life of a young Japanese woman ... (Wikipedia)
Goodbye Tsugumi
by Banana Yoshimoto
A bittersweet story of two cousins, their summer together, and the inevitable goodbye that awaits them.
Tsugumi is a sickly but feisty and somewhat unpleasant young girl living in a small Japanese seaside town at the family inn with her parents, sister Yoko, aunt Masako, and cousin Maria (the ... (Wikipedia)
Sputnik Sweetheart
by Haruki Murakami
A surreal exploration of love and longing, as two people struggle to come to terms with their feelings.
Sumire is an aspiring writer who survives on a family stipend and the creative input of her only friend, the novel's male narrator and protagonist, known in the text only as 'K'. K is an elementary ... (Wikipedia)
Revenge
by Yōko Ogawa
A vengeful tale of a woman determined to exact justice and reclaim her stolen childhood.
Sinister forces draw together a cast of desperate characters in this eerie and absorbing novel from Yoko Ogawa. An aspiring writer moves into a new apartment and discovers that her landlady has ... (Goodreads)
Asleep
by Banana Yoshimoto
A young woman's journey of grief and recovery after the death of her mother.
Banana Yoshimoto has a magical ability to animate the lives of her young characters, and here she spins the stories of three women, all bewitched into a spiritual sleep. One, mourning a lost lover, ... (Goodreads)
Kafka on the Shore
by Haruki Murakami
A surreal journey of self-discovery, exploring the boundaries between the real and surreal.
Comprising two distinct but interrelated plots, the narrative runs back and forth between both plots, taking up each plotline in alternating chapters. The odd-numbered chapters tell the 15-year-old ... (Wikipedia)
1Q84
by Haruki Murakami
A surreal journey of two people entangled in a mysterious dual-world conspiracy.
The events of 1Q84 take place in Tokyo during a fictionalized year of 1984, with the first volume set between April and June, the second between July and September, and the third between October and ... (Wikipedia)
The Story of a Seagull and the Cat Who Taught Her to Fly
by Luis Sepúlveda
A charming story of a seagull and a cat who teach each other lessons of determination and resilience.
A cat. A seagull. An impossible task. A worldwide bestseller and the subject of a feature film, THE STORY OF A SEAGULL... is finally out in paperback! Her wings burdened by an oil slick, a seagull ... (Goodreads)
A Tale for the Time Being
by Ruth Ozeki
An exploration of the connections between two lives, bridging time, space and cultures.
In Tokyo, sixteen-year-old Nao has decided there’s only one escape from her aching loneliness and her classmates’ bullying, but before she ends it all, Nao plans to document the life of her ... (Goodreads)
Pedro Páramo
by Juan Rulfo
A man returns to his hometown in search of his father, discovering the ghostly inhabitants.
A classic of Mexican modern literature about a haunted village. As one enters Juan Rulfo's legendary novel, one follows a dusty road to a town of death. Time shifts from one consciousness to another ... (Goodreads)
Call Me By Your Name
by André Aciman
A tender story of first love, exploring the complexities of identity, sexuality and desire.
The narrator, Elio Perlman , recalls the events of the summer of about 1987, when he was seventeen and living with his parents in Italy . Each summer, his parents would take in a doctoral student as ... (Wikipedia)
Love Letters to the Dead
by Ava Dellaira
A young girl's exploration of grief and loss through letters addressed to the deceased.
Laurel has just started class at a new high school. She is a quiet student who still dresses like she's in middle school. Mrs. Buster, her English teacher, gives the class an assignment to write a ... (Wikipedia)
Ring
by Kōji Suzuki
A family's supernatural encounters and their quest to unravel the mysteries of an ancient curse.
A mysterious videotape warns that the viewer will die in one week unless a certain, unspecified act is performed. Exactly one week after watching the tape, four teenagers die one after another of ... (Goodreads)
Nocturnes: Five Stories of Music and Nightfall
by Kazuo Ishiguro
A collection of tales exploring the connections between music, memory, and the night.
One of the most celebrated writers of our time gives us his first cycle of short fiction: five brilliantly etched, interconnected stories in which music is a vivid and essential character. A ... (Goodreads)
Out
by Natsuo Kirino
Exploration of the dark side of modern society through the story of four female factory workers.
The novel tells the tales of four women, working the graveyard shift at a Japanese bento factory. All four women live hard lives. Masako, the leader of the four women, feels completely alienated from ... (Wikipedia)
The Prince and the Dressmaker
by Jen Wang
A young prince hires a dressmaker to create stunning dresses for him, but must keep his secret from the world.
After creating a shocking dress for a young lady attending the 16th birthday party of Crown Prince Sebastian of Belgium, the young seamstress Frances is hired by a mysterious client. The client, who ... (Wikipedia)
Among Others
by Jo Walton
A young girl navigates life after a traumatic event, finding solace in books and magic.
The novel is presented as the diary of Morgana, a 15-year-old Welsh science fiction and fantasy fan, in 1979 and 1980. She and her twin sister Morwenna, both frequently using the nicknames "Mor" or ... (Wikipedia)
Americanah
by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
An exploration of race, identity, and belonging as two Nigerian immigrants experience life in America and beyond.
Ifemelu and Obinze are young and in love when they depart military-ruled Nigeria for the West. Beautiful, self-assured Ifemelu heads for America, where despite her academic success, she is forced to ... (Goodreads)
Kokoro
by Natsume Sōseki
Story of an elderly man's search for companionship and solace amid loneliness and heartache.
Part I – “Sensei and I” As the novel opens, the narrator has been left on his own in Kamakura after his friend, who invited him to vacation there, is called home by his family. One day, after ... (Wikipedia)
Hopscotch
by Julio Cortázar
A surrealist journey of self-exploration and imaginative play.
Horacio Oliveira is an Argentinian writer who lives in Paris with his mistress, La Maga, surrounded by a loose-knit circle of bohemian friends who call themselves "the Club." A child's death and La ... (Goodreads)
Snow
by Orhan Pamuk
A man's journey of self-discovery in a politically charged atmosphere in Turkey.
Though most of the early part of the story is told in the third person from Ka's point of view, an omniscient narrator sometimes makes his presence known, posing as a friend of Ka's who is telling ... (Wikipedia)
Villette
by Charlotte Brontë
A young woman's journey of self-discovery in a foreign land, overcoming societal constraints.
Villette begins with its famously passive protagonist, Lucy Snowe, age 14, staying at the home of her godmother Mrs. Bretton in "the clean and ancient town of Bretton", in England. Also in residence ... (Wikipedia)
The Music of What Happens
by Bill Konigsberg
Two boys from different worlds work together at a food truck over the summer, navigating their personal struggles and falling in love.
* "Konigsberg demonstrates once again why he is one of the major voices in LGBTQ literature." –, Booklist, starred review Max: Chill. Sports. Video games. Gay and not a big deal, not to him, not to ... (Barnes & Noble)
Extraordinary Means
by Robyn Schneider
Two teens with tuberculosis fall in love at a sanatorium, but their future is uncertain. A poignant story of hope and resilience.
John Green's The Fault in Our Stars meets Rainbow Rowell's Eleanor & Park in this darkly funny novel from the critically acclaimed author of The Beginning of Everything . Up until his diagnosis, Lane ... (Barnes & Noble)
Memories of My Melancholy Whores
by Gabriel García Márquez
An elderly man's reflections on love and life, through the lens of a young prostitute.
An old journalist, who has just celebrated his 90th birthday, seeks sex with a 14 year old prostitute, who is selling her virginity to help her family. Instead of sex, he discovers love for the first ... (Wikipedia)
Battle Royale
by Koushun Takami
High school students forced to fight to the death in a dystopian society.
Battle Royale takes place in a fictional fascist Japan in the year 1997. The state, known as the Republic of Greater East Asia (,大東亜共和国,, Dai Tōa Kyōwakoku,) , arose after an alternate World War 2 ... (Wikipedia)
What's Left of Me
by Kat Zhang
In a world where everyone is born with two souls in one body, Eva and Addie are different. Eva refuses to fade away, causing a dangerous struggle for control.
The Hybrid Chronicles books are set in an alternate universe society in which at birth every body possesses two ' souls ', or human identities. One of these identities is supposed to fade away with ... (Wikipedia)
The Inheritance Cycle
by Christopher Paolini
A young farm boy discovers a dragon egg, leading him on a journey to overthrow an evil king and restore peace to the land.
The much-anticipated worldwide bestselling Inheritance cycle. ... (Goodreads)
Misguided Angel
by Melissa de la Cruz
A vampire girl struggles to find her place in the world while navigating love, betrayal, and danger in the glamorous world of Manhattan's elite.
After inheriting the dark Van Alen Legacy, Schuyler fled to Florence–with her forbidden love, Jack. Now the two of them must embark on the mission Schuyler was destined to complete: to find and ... (Barnes & Noble)
Let's Get Lost
by Adi Alsaid
A road trip adventure following five teens across the United States, each searching for something different.
The debut novel from Adi Alsaid, acclaimed author of Never Always Sometimes , North of Happy , and We Didn’t Ask for This Five strangers. 4,286 miles. One epic adventure. Hudson, Bree, Elliot, and ... (Barnes & Noble)
