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📁 RETURN TO FIRST IMPRESSIONS📁 RETURN TO CHA REVIEW OF BOOKS AND FILMS Dennis Würthner (translator), Tales of the Strange by a Korean Confucian Monk: Kŭmo sinhwa by Kim Sisŭp, University of Hawai‘i Press, 2020. 402 pgs. Also known as…
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📁 RETURN TO FIRST IMPRESSIONS📁 RETURN TO CHA REVIEW OF BOOKS AND FILMS Élise Girard (director), Sidonie in Japan, 2024. 95 min. Sidonie Perceval (Isabelle Huppert) is a writer, or at least she once was. She has now decided to…
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📁 RETURN TO FIRST IMPRESSIONS📁 RETURN TO CHA REVIEW OF BOOKS AND FILMS Leanne Dunic, Wet, Talonbooks, April 2024. 133 pgs. Interwoven throughout Wet, Leanne Dunic’s most recent book named as one of the 37 poetry collections the Canadian Broadcasting…
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📁 RETURN TO FIRST IMPRESSIONS📁 RETURN TO CHA REVIEW OF BOOKS AND FILMS Sosuke Natsukawa (author), Louise Heal Kawai (translator), The Cat Who Saved Books, HarperCollins, 2021. 208 pgs. The Cat Who Saved Books starts sadly when the main character, Rintaro…
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📁RETURN TO FIRST IMPRESSIONS 📁RETURN TO CHA REVIEW OF BOOKS AND FILMS Kim Hyesoon (author), Don Mee Choi (translator), Phantom Pain Wings, New Directions, 2023. 208 pgs. Reading Kim Hyesoon’s Phantom Pain Wings is an uncanny experience of growing wings and…
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📁 RETURN TO FIRST IMPRESSIONS📁 RETURN TO CHA REVIEW OF BOOKS AND FILMS Click HERE to read all entries in Cha on Life Ceremony. Sayaka Murata (author), Ginny Tapley Takemori (translator), Life Ceremony, Granta Books, 2023. 272 pgs. Sayaka Murata’s Life Ceremony is a disturbing…
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茶 FIRST IMPRESSIONS 茶 REVIEW OF BOOKS & FILMS [FIRST IMPRESSIONS] “A Portrait of Those Left Behind: The Foolish Bird” by X. H. Collins Huang Ji and Ryuji Otsuka (directors and screenwriters), The Foolish Bird 笨鳥, 2017. 118 min. One…
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📁 RETURN TO FIRST IMPRESSIONS📁 RETURN TO CHA REVIEW OF BOOKS AND FILMS Jessica J. Lee, Two Trees Make a Forest, Catapult, 2020, 282 pgs. The first day in the cloud forest softened me to fog… Behind me, if I held…
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📁 RETURN TO FIRST IMPRESSIONS📁 RETURN TO CHA REVIEW OF BOOKS AND FILMS Amy Lin, Here After, Zibby Books, 2024, 272 pgs. My dad became a widower in his late thirties. I was born a few years after that, a…


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![[FIRST IMPRESSIONS] “Spectral Valency: Élise Girard’s 𝑆𝑖𝑑𝑜𝑛𝑖𝑒 𝑖𝑛 𝐽𝑎𝑝𝑎𝑛” by Oliver Farry](https://chajournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/elise-girard-director-sidonie-in-japan-2024.-95-min.jpg?w=559)
![[REVIEW] “A Poem Epic in Length, Powerfully Cautionary: Leanne Dunic’s 𝑊𝑒𝑡” by Marsha McDonald](https://chajournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/wet_leanne-dunic-wet-talonbooks.jpg?w=1000)
![[REVIEW] “A Quirky Composite Portrait: 𝑇ℎ𝑒 𝐵𝑜𝑜𝑘 𝑜𝑓 𝐵𝑒𝑖𝑗𝑖𝑛𝑔” by Sabina Knight](https://chajournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/bingbing-shi-editor-the-book-of-beijing.jpg?w=732)
![[REVIEW] “A Criticism of the Ways in Which Modern Society Treats, Sees, and Produces Books: Sosuke Natsukawa’s 𝑇ℎ𝑒 𝐶𝑎𝑡 𝑊ℎ𝑜 𝑆𝑎𝑣𝑒𝑑 𝐵𝑜𝑜𝑘𝑠” by Hui-Hua Lu](https://chajournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/the-cat-who-saved-cats_sosuke-natsukawa.jpg?w=992)
![[REVIEW] “The Birth of Deathly Birds: Kim Hyesoon’s 𝑃ℎ𝑎𝑛𝑡𝑜𝑚 𝑃𝑎𝑖𝑛 𝑊𝑖𝑛𝑔𝑠” by Kammy Lee](https://chajournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/phantom-pain-wings.jpg?w=1000)
![[FIRST IMPRESSIONS] “When The Translations Hit, They Really Hit: Sayaka Murata’s 𝐿𝑖𝑓𝑒 𝐶𝑒𝑟𝑒𝑚𝑜𝑛𝑦” by Grace Najmulski](https://chajournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/life-ceremony_cha.jpg?w=933)
![[FIRST IMPRESSIONS] “A Portrait of Those Left Behind: 𝑇ℎ𝑒 𝐹𝑜𝑜𝑙𝑖𝑠ℎ 𝐵𝑖𝑟𝑑” by X. H. Collins](https://chajournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/the-foolish-bird_cha.jpg?w=800)
![[REVIEW] “Our Histories House So Much Loss But They House So Much Love Too: Jessica J. Lee’s 𝑇𝑤𝑜 𝑇𝑟𝑒𝑒𝑠 𝑀𝑎𝑘𝑒 𝑎 𝐹𝑜𝑟𝑒𝑠𝑡” by Tracy Hwang](https://chajournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/two-trees-make-a-forest.jpg?w=1024)
![[REVIEW] “To Mourn and Remember: Amy Lin’s 𝐻𝑒𝑟𝑒 𝐴𝑓𝑡𝑒𝑟” by Susan Blumberg-Kason](https://chajournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/here-after-amy-lin-copy.jpg?w=817)