Book Review of The Book of Form and Emptiness by Ruth Ozeki (560 pages) Reviewer: Rebecca Otowa Readers of this website may remember that I wrote a piece called “Insight on a Rainy Day” in August 2022, largely about the Heart Sutra (Hannya Shingyo) and its central message, “Emptiness is none other than form; form is …Read More
Category: Book Reviews (Page 2 of 4)
Review by Rebecca Otowa I wanted to read and review this book for two reasons. First, I was captivated by the very attractive cover illustration by Kawase Hasui. Second, I myself had visited the city of Kanazawa in 2021 – though my visit was short, I did manage to see some of the more important …Read More
Wintermoon, by Robert Maclean. Isobar Press, Tokyo, 2022. A review by Mark Richardson. I’m most at home with verse conventional to English from the 16th through the 20th centuries. I enjoy poems that argue or imply arguments. I want rhyme, well-framed stanzas, conceits. Give me Hardy, Herbert, Larkin, Frost or Bishop⎯or Seidel and Ogden Nash. …Read More
REVIEW by Rebecca Otowa THE WIDOW, THE PRIEST AND THE OCTOPUS HUNTERBy Amy Chavex (Tuttle 2022) Available on Amazon Amy Chavez has had an unusual life in Japan. Beginning in a teaching position in Okayama, a city between Kobe and Hiroshima, she moved to an island in the nearby Japan Sea known as Shiraishi (White …Read More
Writers in Kyoto would like to extend heartfelt thanks to our friends at the Ireland Japan Association (IJS) for their assistance in promoting our fourth anthology, Structures of Kyoto, across the Emerald Isle. Structures of Kyoto is now housed in the library of the Visitors’ Centre at the Lafacadio Hearn Japanese Gardens in County Waterford. …Read More
Book Review by Rebecca Otowa OF ARCS AND CIRCLES: insights from Japan on gardens, nature, and artby Marc Peter Keane (Stone Bridge Press, 2019) The first thing I noticed about this book is that it is made up of essays, similar to Pilgrim at Tinker Creek and Teaching a Stone to Talk by Annie Dillard, which …Read More
THE SHORT STORY COLLECTIVE: 13 TALES FROM JAPAN by Andrew Innes Available from Amazon in paperback and ebook formats Review by Rebecca Otowa This collection of 13 short stories invites the reader to join the author in a challenging navigation of the seas of reality and fantasy. There are twists, turns and illusions galore, and …Read More
Kyoto Journal 100th Issue Published Review by Rebecca Otowa Sept. 24, 2021 This month, throughout Japan and the world of people who love Japan, a great sigh of relief and satisfaction could be felt. The 100th issue of the prestigious Kyoto Journal was published. Since it first saw the light in 1987, this quarterly publication …Read More
Book review by Jann Williams of Black Dragonfly by Jean Pasley (Balestier Press, 2021) Black Dragonfly is a book of rich imagination, inspired by and incorporating the work of Patrick Lafcadio Hearn (1850 – 1904). Hearn, of Greek-Irish heritage, spent the last 14 years of his life in Japan, recording aspects of Japanese life that …Read More
Reading Inaka: Portraits of Life in Rural Japanby Chad Kohalyk In a small city in western Canada — which one might call inaka by dint of the high ratio of giant pickup trucks and the 95% white demographics — a group of immigrant moms from Japan, most married to Canadians, decided to band together. Their …Read More
WiK Writing Competition
Ninth Annual Writing Competition Winners (2024) (Coming in Mid-May)
Previous years:
Eighth Annual Writing Competition Winners (2023)
Seventh Annual Writing Competition Winners (2022)
WiK Anthologies
The Nature of Kyoto (2023)
Eds. Lisa Twaronite Sone & Robert Weis
Foreword by Pico Iyer
Structures of Kyoto (2021)
Eds: Rebecca Otowa & Karen Lee Tawarayama
Foreword by Judith Clancy
Encounters with Kyoto (2019)
Eds: Jann Williams & Ian Josh Yates
Foreword by Juliet Winters Carpenter
Echoes (2017)
Eds: John Dougill, Amy Chavez, & Mark Richardson
Preface by Alex Kerr
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