The latest addition to my website is Yōko Ogawa‘s ミーナの行進 (Mina’s Matchbox). Tomoko’s father has died and her mother has to study so Tomoko is sent off to her aunt, her mother’s sister, who is married to a man who runs a successful energy drinks company. She gets on well with all the family, particularly her cousin Mina, a bit younger than Tomoko who has frequent asthma attacks and collects matchboxes. There a few oddities – her uncle frequently disappears for days on end, the family has a pet pygmy hippopotamus, her aunt is obsessed with misprints and her uncle’s mother, Rosa, a German Jewess lives with them and still struggles with Japanese.This is a low key novel and not much happens apart from the girls following he volleyball at the 1972 Olympics and Tomoko discovering reading. but certainly a pleasant read.