On Reading: a Thursday afternoon

I went to our local indie bookstore yesterday with my husband. I say indie because it was a carefully designed and curated little store that bubbled with warmth and whimsy, rather than the cooler tones of the Collins in the city shopping centre (though the staff there are also really lovely). It has been drizzling with rain all week (which I'm really hoping and praying some of which actually landed on the farms around town because goodness knows they've needed it) and we were feeling a little stir-crazy being cooped up in the house for so long.

My purchases - because I am somehow incapable of walking out of a bookstore without a book - included a short fiction and novella compilation called Tailored Realities by Brandon Sanderson and Hot Chocolate on Thursday by Michiko Aoyama.

Tailored Realities I started reading right away after plonking myself on a very soft leather couch in the store. I was captivated first by the absurdity of Sanderson's short sci-fi supposal called Brain Dump that explored the bizarre scenario of shopping for brains in a futuristic society the way one might shop for an Apple iPhone today. Having recently been slightly obsessed with reading Issac Asimov's I, Robot, the tone shift from what Sanderson usually writes was very welcome. As a happenstance reader I also really appreciated the short note from the author at the end of the story - it's always nice to hear from the writer of your favourite novels.

Hot Chocolate on Thursday is a sweet little book about the frequenters of a small cafe by the river in Tokyo. It's quite a short novel; only 168 pages long. And the small moments I have dedicated to reading it (in between gutting my cupboard of clothes that no longer fit due to the ever-growing beachball in my belly, cooking fish and chips with my husband and catching up on my registers for work) have been a delight.

I loved how the opening story featured the one-sided love of a young newly-appointed cafe manager for a young woman whom he dubs Ms Hot Chocolate. The simple descriptions of the cafe atmosphere and the patrons themselves almost felt like a warm hot chocolate for my ever-foggy brain.

The intricate and unexpected connections between characters made the story feel like a beautifully interconnected tapestry - the ancient kind where it is almost impossible to distinguish individual stitches because the overall detailed image flows so well.

The second story paints a vivid picture of a young workaholic mother feeling out of her depth trying to make a rolled egg omelette for her son's lunchbox for the first time. A kind word from her emerging-artist husband gives her soul the nourishment it needed to be okay with a little chaos - and her son becomes captivated by the unconventional beauty of her attempt at the omelette.

I have only read these two chapters/stories so far. And I have thoroughly enjoyed the healing hot chocolate that it has been for my own busy mind.

It's been a while since I've become hooked on a book so quickly and felt such pleasure in reading it. So I researched the author and found that she had written two other books that also featured similar tales of heart-felt connections and simple moments. I can safely say that What You Are Looking For Is in the Library and Matcha on Monday are definitely on my next to read list.

Do you know what I was also surprisingly thrilled to discover? After going down my Michiko Aoyama rabbit-hole for a little while I realised quite a beautiful and hopeful fact. Writers, editors and publishers. These people and professions still exist. I will admit, after a few too many Instagram doom-scrolls I became quite despondent about the future of writing (at least human writing). But the twelve-year-old version of me (the version that once cooked up fantastical stories under the pews of my old church to share enthusiastically with my friends) became suddenly elated by the realisation that that gorgeous peaceful little book Hot Chocolate on Thursday had been published in 2026! The journey of a book lover, journalist, editor and writer is still there to be taken even now. And that is an exciting and hopeful thought.

This brings us to the end of my thoughts and reflections on these novels and reading for now, I look forward to more enjoyable book reflections in the future.

Much love,

Mrs Tea