Shipwrecks by Akira Yoshimura – The Road Not Taken
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Genre: Historical Fiction
Age Demographic: Teen 13+
Page Count: 180
Publish: 1982
Review
A little backstory here, I read a book that is very similar to this book title The Wreckers by Ian Lawrence. I will write a whole post comparing these two books.
Shipwrecks is a slow burn historical fiction about a remote village that makes a livelihood of fishing and if they can not trade enough fish to the village in the mountains then, family members has to sell themselves in to servitude for a curtain number of years. All of this is from the eyes of a boy name Isaku.
This book does not hold your hand with the gruesome things that happen in the village’s day to day life. Accidents and death happen. People come back from years of bondage a shell of their former self. All with the change of the seasons.
Along with the winter season comes o-fune-sama, the sea god. On stormy nights the lights from the caldron lower ships to wreck on the shores. The villagers plunder the cargo and kill any remaining sailors. This is how the village survives. The villagers pray and hold rituals in hopes that o-fune-sama happens.
This is a slow going story with a lot happening that keeps the book interesting. The tension of o-fune-sama, is it going to happen, are the villagers going to get caught doing it?
Shipwrecks is base off the villages living on the cost of Japan, who practice o-fune-sama for their survival.
I did not doubt that historically remote coastal villages in Japan plunder cargo from wrecked ships. When there are historical accounts of people doing the same in England, why not other parts of the world?
As one reviewer on GR mention, the villagers are using religion for their own gain and I agree with that. We as humans are fallen, religion was created by mankind and due to our fallen nature religion is inherently flaw.
I would also like to add in a remote village everyone holds to the same belief with no way for new beliefs to question or challenge them.
My impression of the ending was ‘that it’. I mean its a good ending that leaves the door open as to what will happen next. I do imagens that most readers will come to a similar conclusion as to the events that will play out. I kinda want more with the ending but, can be content with how it ends.
If you want to read a slow burn historical fiction set in medieval Japan then check out Shipwrecks by Akira Yoshimura.
About the History
Reviews of Shipwrecks from other bloggers:
Nobody would feed those judged certain to die. | Pechorin’s Journal
