#Sweet bean paste book movie#
#Sweet bean paste book full#

I appreciate the offer, but I’m not sure. Sentaro leaned over, the way he did when he handed dorayaki to children and elderly customers.

‘Sorry? What’s that?’ The woman cupped her hand around her ear. I can only manage six hundred yen an hour.’ How could he send her away without causing offence? Sentaro scraped the spatula on the edge of the bowl while he groped for the right words. Sentaro laughed before he could stop himself. ‘Can I apply? I always wanted a job like this.’ ‘Um…’ She leaned forward, ‘I wonder if I could I apply?’ A gentle gust of wind shook the tree, setting adrift petals that wafted through the open window to land on the griddle. ‘Got someone in mind? A grandchild, perhaps?’ He noticed that her fingers were bent like hooks. ‘About this,’ she said, raising her hand with a slow, deliberate motion to point at a Help Wanted notice taped to the window. She had been at the shop a few days earlier. The woman smiled stiffly and shuffled closer. And it wasn’t the flowers, but rather Sentaro himself that she seemed to be observing. When he next looked up, however, she was still there. He assumed she was looking at the billowing cloud of cherry blossom on the tree outside the shop. Sentaro looked up to see an elderly lady in a white hat standing on the roadside, but immediately turned back to the bowl of batter he was mixing.

#Sweet bean paste book full#

Today, however, perhaps because the flowers were in full bloom, there were more people about than usual. Cherry Blossom Street was a run-down commercial strip in a depressed part of town, a street more notable for empty shops than the cherry trees planted sparsely on either side. Sentaro stood over a hot griddle inside the Doraharu shop, as he did all day everyday, cooking pancakes for his dorayaki. Read moreĪ sweetly scented breeze blew along Cherry Blossom Street. In other words, I wish the author had just recounted the final events and left the philosophy out of it.A good read, though. I could have done without it, although the events in it were necessary for the story to resolve. In my opinion, the third part worked less well than the first two. It looked at the life led by victims of leprosy in Japan, both before and after the law that segregated them forcibly from the rest of the population.Finally, in the last chapter or so, it became a philosophical discussion about life.The first part entertained wonderfully. The reader can expect a little humor, a few pithy life-hack sayings and generally has a pleasant time.About a third of the way through the story, it took a more somber turn.

#Sweet bean paste book movie#

Something like the movie Today's Special. I found this a very interesting book as my perception of what type of story was being told morphed more than once as it progressed.When it opened, it seemed to be one of those stories where the superficial protagonist gets reluctantly mentored by someone who doesn't, at first glance, appear to be a sage. Translated into English for the first time, Durian Sukegawa’s beautiful prose is capturing hearts all over the world. Sweet Bean Paste is a moving novel about the burden of the past and the redemptive power of friendship. She begins to teach him her craft, but as their friendship flourishes, social pressures become impossible to escape and Tokue’s dark secret is revealed, Tokue makes the best sweet bean paste Sentaro has ever tasted. Into his life comes Tokue, an elderly woman with disfigured hands and a troubled past.

With only the blossoming of the cherry trees to mark the passing of time, he spends his days in a tiny confectionery shop selling dorayaki, a type of pancake filled with sweet bean paste. He has a criminal record, drinks too much, and his dream of becoming a writer is just a distant memory. I Love YouĪ charming tale of friendship, love and loneliness in contemporary Japan 'I'm in story heaven with this book.' Cecelia Ahern, author of P.S.