'The Commoner' by John Burnham Schwartz is the book club selection for March. After recently enjoying historical fiction about Henry VII, I hope to learn some history about the Japanese royal family.
This is my 30th book in the 50 book challenge, which means I am almost 60% complete in 6 months. I am really enjoying this challenge so far. Even though I haven't loved all the books I have read, I am making myself complete books that I might normally give up on. I think this is a great reward to me as a reader.
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That's exactly how I feel about the challenge.
ReplyDeleteI just finished 'The Commoner' and I thought it was okay. The story kept me interested and went pretty fast, but I didn't feel like there were many details in the story. I really felt sorry for Haruko when she had to give up seeing her family and not being able to raise her own children. I also felt sorry for Keiko when she was pressured into being the new Princess. I think the point of the book was to show us that being a Princess/Empress is a hard lifestyle because your feelings don't matter. I guess I was just disappointed, because I wanted to learn more about the lifestyle of Japanese royalty.
ReplyDeleteIt sounds like your feelings were about it matched the general feelings of half the book club.
ReplyDeleteJust read your comment on my blog and wanted to add that Haruko and Keiko actually follow pretty closely the story of the current Empress and Princess. The only thing I don't know is if the Empress actually had a breakdown.
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