Title: Memoirs of a Geisha
Author: Arthur Golden
Genre: Historical Fiction
Synopsis: 9-year-old Chiyo lives in a poor fishing village with her parents and sister in Japan. Chiyo's mother is dying and when Mr. Tanaka, a wealthy man from town, encounters Chiyo in the street he makes an offer to her father, she and her sister are sold and taken to Gion. Chiyo is sold to an okiya as a maid and is offered the possibility to train as a geisha, but it is not as simple as it sounds. It is a difficult life, to begin with, but especially when the only geisha in the okiya has decided Chiyo is the enemy. When Chiyo meets the chairman of the major electric company in Japan her hope of becoming a geisha is renewed, but that brings its own unique set of challenges.
My Thoughts
I know I'm super late to the game on this book, it is already critically acclaimed and has been made into a movie, but when it was first published I was much too young to read it. (I was about nine.) A colleague of mine had recommended it several times as his favorite book so when I found it on the clearance rack at Barnes and Noble I had to pick it up.
I really enjoyed following Chiyo's journey to becoming Sayuri, a Gion geisha. I learned a lot about the life, training, and expectations of a geisha and the added historical context of being a geisha in Japan during WWII. I have read so much about the perspectives of the people in Allied countries during WWII but much less about those living in Axis countries, especially those who were not active military participants. There are so many layers to this novel driven by complex characters and I really loved reading it... even if I was late to the game.
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