The Great Passage

By: Shion Miura, Juliet Winters Carpenter - translator

Narrated by: Brian Nishii

A charmingly warm and hopeful story of love, friendship, and the power of human connection. Award-winning Japanese author Shion Miura's novel is a reminder that a life dedicated to passion is a life well lived.

Inspired as a boy by the multiple meanings to be found for a single word in the dictionary, Kohei Araki is devoted to the notion that a dictionary is a boat to carry us across the sea of words. But after thirty-seven years creating them at Gembu Books, it's time for him to retire and find his replacement.

He discovers a kindred spirit in Mitsuya Majime - a young, disheveled square peg with a penchant for collecting antiquarian books and a background in linguistics - whom he swipes from his company's sales department.

Led by his new mentor and joined by an energetic, if reluctant, new recruit and an elder linguistics scholar, Majime is tasked with a career-defining accomplishment: completing The Great Passage, a comprehensive 2,900-page tome of the Japanese language. On his journey, Majime discovers friendship, romance, and an incredible dedication to his work, inspired by the bond that connects us all: words.

©2012 Shion Miura (P)2017 Brilliance Publishing, Inc., all rights reserved. Translation © 2017 Juliet Winters Carpenter.

Critic reviews

"Brian Nishii is the perfect narrator for this audiobook... The book's translation combined with Nishii's narration makes the story sound and feel Japanese - there's a subtle choppiness, and certain word choices and phrases aren't what native English speakers would say - and it's all entirely fitting and charming....a unique and fascinating listen." ( AudioFile)

A Low Key Enjoyable Novel

I enjoyed this experience. There is something intriguing to me about stories set in deeply detailed, specialized environments. In this case, the world of Japanese dictionary publishing. It's not a potboiler, in terms of dramatic events, but in exchange one gets intricacies of Japanese office and social culture. As a Japanese language learner, I really enjoyed the focus on words. I could see how this might not be as interesting to folks without a prior relationship to Japanese language. But in encouragement, I will say that the translation is really good - I always felt like I got the context of a situation without over-explaining - and the narrator, Brian Nishii, is excellent.

Watch the Anime First

The book fills in several things, but the anime does a better job making the individual characters more distinct.

Overall, both are well worth it!

TRANSPORTATIONAL

Definitions 1 & 2a
Merriam-Webster dictionary
From beginning to end. Although the end should have been written with an open question to leave the reader/listener with something to think about.

Awkward at a Whole New Level

If you've read one socially awkward book about the many different meanings of Japanese words and language, and the efforts of an unusual cast of characters that forms an unlikely team to create the world's greatest dictionary despite endless obstacles and setbacks, then you've read them all. ;)

This was heartfelt and charming, even though it often reads like a rough week at quiz bowl camp. There's something so uneasy about some of the characters themselves, that you almost feel awkward and uncomfortable just reading about them. . . and I mean that as a compliment, as I think this group of complete misfits was fascinating. I'd like to be friends with all of them. Honestly, I probably am, since I'm also a word nerd and tend to collect unusual people.

When I picked this up, I expected it would suck, and yet I was very close to bumping this up to 5 stars. I think it fell just shy in that I wanted a bit more, especially from some of the side characters. In fact, this is a book that could have benefited from 50 more pages, even though the story is interesting and complete as it is.

I LOVE IT SO MUCH

My new favorite novel, it really touched my heart and made me happy. I think is kind of a peculiar novel because of its main subjet, dictionary making, though the autor managed to make a very interesting and human story. I learned to love all the characters and now I'm very interested on Shion Miura's work. I knew about this novel on a Brian Nishii YouTube video and I'm very glad, I also loved his performance.

A novel for word lovers

Sweet and quirky and surprisingly engaging given that it's a book in English (translated from Japanese) about Japanese etymology.

If you're a word nerd, you'll like this book.

I listened to this because I was interested in it from both a topic and a cultural perspective. If writing dictionaries is anywhere near as complex as this novel presents it to be, it's completely amazing. And the thoughtful aesthetics and cultural details in the book (especially the paper selection) are fascinating. The characters and story weren't surprising, but they were really lovely. This nerdy little book about dictionaries made me smile.

A real surprise-totally sucked into story - characters were interesting

Hard to believe a story about assembling a dictionary would have fascinating characters, a few dramatic moments, and background info about the culture and the process. Very enjoyable and well narrated.

Joy and Passion

This is a remarkable book about a group of people who discover that their jobs become their passion and their various journeys of self discovery. The translation is good and the reader is excellent.

Perfection

I was mesmerized by this book and the beautiful depiction of the complex nuances of the Japanese language and the contribution of history and society to definitions and usage of words. I think anyone with an appreciation for words and language would thoroughly enjoy this story. Those who like Japanese culture would love the details about Japanese day to day life and food. The narration was impeccable!