The Japanese Lover

De: Isabel Allende

Narrado por: Joanna Gleason

From New York Times and internationally best-selling author Isabel Allende, an exquisitely crafted love story and multigenerational epic that sweeps from San Francisco in the present day to Poland and the United States during the Second World War.

In 1939, as Poland falls under the shadow of the Nazis, young Alma Belasco's parents send her away to live in safety with an aunt and uncle in their opulent mansion in San Francisco. There, as the rest of the world goes to war, she encounters Ichimei Fukuda, the quiet and gentle son of the family's Japanese gardener. Unnoticed by those around them, a tender love affair begins to blossom. Following the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, the two are cruelly pulled apart as Ichimei and his family - like thousands of other Japanese Americans - are declared enemies and forcibly relocated to internment camps run by the United States government. Throughout their lifetimes, Alma and Ichimei reunite again and again, but theirs is a love that they are forever forced to hide from the world.

Decades later, Alma is nearing the end of her long and eventful life. Irina Bazili, a care worker struggling to come to terms with her own troubled past, meets the elderly woman and her grandson, Seth, at San Francisco's charmingly eccentric Lark House nursing home. As Irina and Seth forge a friendship, they become intrigued by a series of mysterious gifts and letters sent to Alma, eventually learning about Ichimei and this extraordinary secret passion that has endured for nearly 70 years.

Sweeping through time and spanning generations and continents, The Japanese Lover explores questions of identity, abandonment, redemption, and the unknowable impact of fate on our lives. Written with the same attention to historical detail and keen understanding of her characters that Isabel Allende has been known for since her landmark first novel The House of the Spirits, The Japanese Lover is a profoundly moving tribute to the constancy of the human heart in a world of unceasing change.

©2015 Isabel Allende (P)2015 Simon & Schuster

Allende Lover

Seriously, can Isabel Allende do anything wrong? Nope. This book was wonderful. Took place through different time periods, places and cultures. Though it wasn't a full 5 stars, I would give it 4.5... and that's pretty great in my book.

Sublime

I loved listening to this book. It was sensitive and full of compassion. A pleasure

Awesome book

I really loved this book. It was a book club choice and I was hesitant to listen but sooo happy I did. I laughed and cried. It really sucked me in. Looking for more books by this author. Enjoy

great book

The supporting characters were a bit cheesy but the ending had an unexpected surprise. Overall it was satisfying story.

the best book I have read in a long time.

I I rank it with the Nightingale and a light we cannot see. will bring tears to your eyes.

Exceptional story

Not at all what I was expecting. But beautiful written about personal loves and losses. I highly recommend.

Enjoyable and Unique (for me, anyway)

This is my first Allende book so I've nothing to compare it to. I found it soft (as if viewed through the gauzy/hazy lens of remembrance) and interesting. I finished it in two days.

There appear to be at least two camps of narrators. One that just reads you a story and one that gives each character a voice and individual energy. I suppose there are some that are in the mid range as well and I think that this is where this particular narrator ought to have landed. I can't fault her for the read though. It may have been what was requested or directed. A neutral read so the listener could invent character voices on his or her own. It's not my preference, but I certainly didn't find it offensive.

Beautiful.

Intimately engaging. the reader is lead through the beautiful highs and lows of life, without being forced to stall and suffer at the lows. The narrator stays out of the way.

Beautiful.

Haunting and lovely story about the reality of the complicated relationships of real life!

love this book!!

this book is so beautiful. I loved listening to the story and all of the emotions and how everyone's story seems to have met up at the end...