Riku Onda - Honeybees and Distant Thunder

In a small coastal town just a stone's throw from Tokyo, a prestigious piano competition is underway. Over the course of two feverish weeks, three students will experience some of the most joyous—and painful—moments of their lives. Though they don't know it yet, each will profoundly and unpredictably change the others, for ever.
Aya was a child prodigy who abruptly gave up performing after the death of her mother, and is now trying for a comeback; Masaru, a childhood friend of Aya who came to the piano through her insistence that he learn to play, is now reunited with her after many years, and is equally invested in both his and her success; Akashi, who is older and married, works in a music store and is the “old man” of the competitors, hoping for a final chance at success; and Jin, a sixteen-year-old prodigy, the free spirited son of a beekeeper who travels constantly, and has no formal training (and doesn’t even own a piano) yet whose mesmerizing insight into music has brought him to the attention of one of the world’s most celebrated pianists, the late Maestro Von Hoffman.
Each of them will break the rules, awe their fans and push themselves to the brink. But at what cost?
Beloved in Japan, Riku Onda immerses us in the world of music—from piano masterpieces to the buzz of bees and the rumble of thunder—which crescendos to a surprising ending in this rich and vibrant novel.

Comment: I saw this book at the library and the title certainly caught my eye, for its originality. Since I had previously read books by Japanese authors, that I liked, I wondered if I'd like this too, so I brought it with me.

The international music competition for piano takes place in several cities, including in Japan, and the contestants need to prepare several pieces and there are two eliminations until the final. Akishi, Masuru, Aya and Jin are four of the contestants, each one with a specific reason to play and with a distinguishable style. However, others are going to compete too and the jury has a hard task ahead, for these people are all talented and all symbolize a certain way of looking at classical music. What unites and what separates all these people? Can music really bring people together?

I'm not really certain on how to classify and explain this book. The premise is very simple for such a long book (more than 450 pages in the edition I've read) but somehow one can turn the pages and still be absorbed by the thoughts of these characters and the motions they go through while they are playing.

I don't know much about classical music, much less specific pieces meant to be played on a piano. I know I like listening to some pieces, of course some of the most famous ones, but I cannot truly appreciate the art and precision of how the same piece can sound so different when played by different people - I mean, unless it's done on purpose to be so - or, as I've learned, if the piano isn't tuned or placed on the right spot on the stage. I did like this part of the book: the more technical details shared and how that can influence the music and the sound.

The book is divided into three main sections, what happens during the first elimination, then in the second, and then in the final. We follow the thoughts of several characters, not only the ones competing. I've found this to be a little confusing at times, because we jump from one characters' POV to the next in the following paragraph, often without a graphic break in the text. I guess this is the author's style but it created a certain distance between what was happening and the matching emotions. With this I mean I could easily separate myself  emotionally from what was being shared.

It's natural that some characters seem more approachable than others, and it seems to me that, in the simplicity of their personalities/Japanese culture, a lot is more inferred than shared. Often characters would exhibit feelings and thoughts precisely through the music and not as much through conversation. It is great that music is universal, but I did miss, sometimes, a less subtle information on certain things. For instance, when one of the four main characters is eliminated between the first and the second elimination, we get to see the impact, but it wasn't as heartfelt as it could, if the author had been another one, perhaps.

I would say this is a poetic story. It's more about words we can associate with music, with how certain pieces make one feel and look at the world. One of the characters, for instance, sees the playing of the piano as an extension of some kind of the nature around people and how we overlook or dismiss certain obvious things, like the flapping of wings of a bird, or the sounds of a storm coming... To me, this was all beautiful and rather philosophical, but I can see how it would frustrate some readers too.

This was a good discovery for me, actually. I have a hit and miss experience with Japanese authors, but have enjoyed the majority of what I've read so far, and it was good to see this one does seems appealing.

Grade: 8/10