The Easy Life in Kamusari

About

Yuki, a restless Tokyo teenager with no particular plans, is shipped off to a remote mountain village to work in forestry — a job he neither chose nor wanted. What follows is his reluctant education in the rhythms of rural Japan: felling trees, reading weather, learning the patience required to tend a forest that won't mature for generations. Shion Miura, whose The Great Passage chronicled the making of a dictionary, brings the same affectionate attention to another unglamorous vocation. The novel is funny, warm, and surprisingly moving about the dignity of slow, physical work in a culture obsessed with speed and novelty. A city boy learns that the most radical thing you can do with your life is plant a tree you'll never see fully grown.