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| The Thousand Autumns of Jacob De Zoet |
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| I assigned The Thousand Autumns of Jacob De Zoet to The Wild Burro Books N' Booze Readers Group because I felt guilty. The author, David Mitchell, received accolades and awards for pretty much everything he'd ever written. I had tried to read one of his previous books, Cloud Atlas, and it never grabbed me. I wrote it off as "too literary" for me, carried it for awhile in the store and then let it disappear. And I felt guilty. So when De Zoet came out I guaranteed I'd finish it by making it the book club selection.
What a great choice. A romantic novel set in the late 1700's and early 1800's, Jacob De Zote has signed on with the Dutch East Indies Company and is sent to Nagasaki Harbor, feudal Japan's only window to the outside world. His job is to clean up the companies records, ferret out corruption and payoffs. He is naive and idealistic and vulnerable.
De Zoet applied to the Dutch East Indies Company for the most personal of reasons. It is a position that may turn out to be very lucrative. He has hopes that he will earn enough money in five years to return to Holland and marry his wealthy fiancee. It is not to be. He falls in love with Orito Aibagawa, a midwife to one of the city's most powerful men. The attraction is forbidden. With all this personal and professional turmoil, trouble for De Zoet is intensified when the British decide to gain entry to Japan's markets as well.
My description does the book no justice. It starts subtly but turns into an action packed page turning book, so delightfully written that you are sure you are THERE in Japan's back alleys, THERE watching the tricky Dutch/Japanese trade negotiations with all there hidden agendas and alliances, THERE on the British ship come to force entry to the Island. His sense of place and character is exquisite.
Truly a great read.
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