May 20, 2021 ALL SORROWS CAN BE BORNE by Loren Stephens AUTHOR Q and A @OTRPR

Publisher : Rare Bird Books (May 11, 2021)
Language : English
Hardcover : 360 pages
ISBN-10 : 1644281988

SYNOPSIS: 

Inspired by true events, All Sorrows Can Be Born is the story of Noriko Ito, a Japanese woman faced with unimaginable circumstances that force her to give up her son to save her husband. Set in Hiroshima, Osaka, and the badlands of eastern Montana and spanning the start of World War II to 1982, this breathtaking novel is told primarily in the voice of Noriko, a feisty aspiring actress who fails her audition to enter the Takarazuka Theater Academy. Instead, she takes the “part” of a waitress at a European-style tearoom in Osaka where she meets the mysterious and handsome manager, Ichiro Uchida. They fall in love over music and marry. Soon after Noriko becomes pregnant during their seaside honeymoon, Ichiro is diagnosed with tuberculosis destroying their dreams.

Noriko gives birth to a healthy baby boy, but to give the child a better life, Ichiro convinces her to give the toddler to his older sister and her Japanese-American husband, who live in Montana. Noriko holds on to the belief that this inconceivable sacrifice will lead to her husband’s recovery. What happens next is unexpected and shocking and will affect Noriko for the rest of her life.

ADVANCE PRAISE:

“So many of us have suffered this past year or so. Many of us have had to dig deep within ourselves to learn how to bear sorrows and loss. Many of us have looked to the past for inspiration to get through difficult times. For all these reasons, Loren Stephens’ All Sorrows Can Be Borne has come at the exact right time. Inspired by true events and real people, the story looks at pain and suffering but also the ultimate triumph of love, forgiveness, and compassion. I loved the book.” —Lisa See, author of The Island of Sea Women and Snow Flower and the Secret Fan

“Starting with the heart-wrenching opening chapter of All Sorrows Can be Borne, Loren Stephens weaves a tale of love, family and loss with a page-turning plot. Both harrowing and tender, this generous and emotional novel pulls you into a story of character and place that’s hard to put down. This is a beautiful book.” —Barbara Abercrombie, author of The Language of Loss

“All Sorrows Can Be Borne is a harrowing story of love and betrayal, all the more heartbreaking because it is based on family history. Post-war Japan comes alive in these pages, and even the most unforgivable acts make a tragic kind of sense when viewed through the prism of violence that marked every one of the war’s survivors. As this tale makes clear, in the wake of such trauma, humans can do the unthinkable, both to and for the ones they love.” —Aimee Liu, author of Glorious Boy

MY REVIEW:

All Sorrows Can Be Borne is a story of historical fiction, inspired by true events about author Loren Stephens husband’s Japanese birth parents and the sacrifice, hopes and dreams to give him a better life.

 

The story is a sweeping saga that begins during WWII through 1982, and set in both Osaka and Montana. The story is told primarily in the voice of Noriko an aspiring actress in Osaka who falls in love with Ichiro Uchida, the manager of the tearoom where Noriko worked as a waitress. They fall in love, marry and start a family with a healthy baby boy. But their happy ending is shattered when Ichiro is diagnosed with tuberculosis. They perform the ultimate sacrifice by sending their precious son to her older sister who lives in the badlands of eastern Montana.

 

This story is so well-written that really portrayed the sorrow Noriko had to bear. The writing of Noriko’s character and how she developed from having a very spoiled and privileged upbringing to all the suffering she had to bear as a mother and then to lose her son was incredible portrayed. Stephens captured the true essence of love, family and loss in a beautiful way.

 

In this emotionally charged and heartfelt read, Stephens writes about resilience, strength and courage framed within the backdrop of the Japanese culture and important political climate of the time.

 

I highly recommend this powerful novel. 

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Loren Stephens is a widely published essayist and fiction and nonfiction storyteller. Her work has appeared in the Los Angeles Times, the Chicago Tribune, MacGuffin, the Jewish Women’s Literary Annual, The Forge Literary Magazine, Crack the Spine, Lunch Ticket’s Amuse Bouche series, The Write Launch, The Summerset Review, The Montreal Review, and Tablet travel magazine, to name a few. She is a two-time nominee of the Pushcart Prize and the book Paris Nights: My Year at the Moulin Review, by Cliff Simon with Loren Stephens was named one of the best titles from an independent press by Kirkus Book Reviews. She is president and founder of the ghostwriting companies, Write Wisdom and Bright Star Memoirs. Prior to establishing her company, Loren was a documentary filmmaker. Among her credits are Legacy of the Hollywood Blacklist with on camera narration by Burt Lancaster, produced for PBS and nominated for an Emmy Award; Sojourner Truth: Ain’t I A Woman? produced for Coronet Films and recipient of a Golden Apple from the National Education Association; and Los Pastores: The Shepherd’s Play produced for the Latino Consortium of PBS and recipient of a Cine Gold Eagle and nominated for an Imagen Award. She is a member of the Regional Board of the Anti-Defamation League; a member of its Deborah Awards Committee for Outstanding Women; and a member of Greenlight Women, an organization of women in the entertainment industry who serve as mentors. For more information visit

https://writewisdom.com/.

ALL SORROWS CAN BE BORNE
By Loren Stephens
Rare Bird Books Hardcover; May 11, 2021
(978-1644281987; 320 Pages; $26)
https://rarebirdlit.com/
https://writewisdom.com/

AUTHOR Q and A

An Interview with Loren Stephens, author of ALL SORROWS CAN BE BORNE May 11, 2021, Rare Bird Books 

What gave you the idea to write this novel? 

Many years ago, I asked a writer friend of mine, “Where do you get your ideas for your books?” She answered, “I write what is right in front of me.” I had been married to my husband for just over ten years, and he had shared something of his Japanese family’s history but there was a lot he didn’t know. I asked him if I could research his story and use it as the basis for a novel. He agreed and that triggered my journey to All Sorrows Can Be Borne. 

What kind of research did you do? 

Of course I did a tremendous amount of research on Japanese history, Japanese-American relations before, during and after World War II, the Korean War, Japanese customs, the theater, and the religions of Japan including Tenrikyo, the religion that his mother follows. I also went to Japan for ten days to Osaka, Kyoto and Arashiyama, and met with his birth mother. His adoptive mother, who was born in Japan and is actually his birth father’s sister, accompanied me and acted as translator. We spent hours each day on “book time,” and then toured the cities. I visited my husband’s father’s grave; and his cousins’ and aunts’ and uncles’. I don’t speak any Japanese, but everyone was so cordial to me. We walked around and I stuck out like a bit of a sore thumb – being tall with bright red hair. 

 Did you interview your husband’s adoptive parents and him? 

Yes, I was fascinated to learn about his adoptive father’s background – growing up on a bean farm in Colorado, the son of a Japanese farmer and his picture bride who never learned to speak English. I learned about his adoptive father meeting and marrying his wife when he served in the Korean war based mainly in Japan. His wife was working at a Jack and Jill Club and at the local PX. And, of course, I asked my husband about his own experience in the military, and how he connected with his mother when he was stationed in Japan – how he communicated with her, what they did together when they finally met one another after so many years. 

What that reunion was like? 

I included that in the final section of the book. I had originally not planned on showing the reunion, but it seemed like a terrible cop out and once I finally jumped in and began to write, it became an important ending to the book. 

How did you decide what to include in your book and what to leave out? 

I worked with a number of editors over the time that I was going through various drafts – six in all. At the end of the day, I decided to jettison about half the book I had written and focus most of the story on Japan and on my husband’s birth mother’s story. She became the main narrator. I had to leave so much of his adoptive mother’s life in Japan and in Montana where she lived on the cutting room floor. I honestly have another book just from the stories that I could not include. That was the hardest part of writing the novel – getting rid of so many pages that I spent 2 time writing and rewriting, but I think the book is better for having focused it and keeping his birth mother and father front and center. 

 How did you choose a voice for your book? 

Most of the book is told in the first person – in the voice of Noriko Ito, my husband’s birth mother. By using the personal “I” rather than an omniscient third person narrator, the emotion of her character became more accessible to me. I embodied her character in some ways that I could not have had I stuck with the third person voice, which I used for the other characters. So it goes back and forth from first to third person. I probably could have used several first-person voices but I felt that that would have become too confusing for the reader – but I have seen that done very successfully, most recently in the fabulous novel, A Burning by Indian born writer, Megha Majumdar. 

Did you draw on any of your own life experiences in writing your book? 

Some say that every character is really a reflection of the writer. Well, I am a mother and I certainly drew upon my experience as the mother of a son to create some of the mother-son scenes in the book. I also used my own experience for some of the love scenes and I borrowed some of my husband’s personality traits when trying to create a full portrait of his father. He actually said to me, “I see that my father has some of my habits.” For example, my husband is very organized. I made his father a very organized person. And there are others. His father was a very hard worker and was compulsive in getting things finished. My husband is the same way. My husband is also a record-keeper and I had his father do the same thing. 

Were there any strange, serendipitous occurrences that happened while you were writing the book? 

When I got back from Japan, I had many hours of interviews that were partially in English and partially in Japanese. I needed to find a Japanese-English translator. My husband offered to help and put out an email blast. Someone answered by the name of Marlon Okazaki, who is a professional translator. He spent hours listening to the tapes. I received a call from him. He said, “You know it’s really strange, but your mother and I belong to the same church. I am a minister of the Tenrikyo Church as is my father and my grandfather. Your mother-in-law goes to the Tenrikyo Church in Nara, Japan. When you asked her in the tape how did she face the heartbreak of losing her son and her husband, she answered “Tenrikyo.” He then said, “I was shocked when I heard this. What an amazing coincidence.” I subsequently went to Marlon’s church in downtown Los Angeles, and we have become wonderful friends. And when he goes to Japan and to Nara for national meetings of Tenrikyo he gets in touch with my mother-in-law and has brought her information about us, and translated subsequent letters that my husband and I have written to her. 3 You established a ghostwriting company and have written books for other people. 

How is this different? 

In a way it is not that different. My job as a ghostwriter is to get into someone else’s head and to put on the page as loyally as I can their thoughts and experiences. I try to do the same thing with the characters in my novel. I begin to inhabit them over time and try and let them “speak to me.” I know that sounds a little whoo whoo but that is what happens. I remember a long time ago I met with Rudolfo Anaya, who wrote Bless Me Ultima. He told me that late at night he sits in his study and the curanderas (witches) come to visit him and tell him what to write. I believe him. There are of course differences in writing someone else’s book and writing your own. I can let my imagination create characters I need to move the story along or change some of the plot to make it more dramatic. For example, my husband’s father’s step-mother actually died shortly after the War. I kept her alive, and she appears many times in the narrative, managing to torture him mercilessly just as she did when she was alive. 

What other art forms do you draw from when writing a novel? 

Movies are a great resource for me. In fact, I think about my scenes in much the same way that a director shoots a scene in a film. I try and bring the reader into the scene; and end the scene with a cliff hangar that will drive the plot along. I also like to include allusions to movies. For example, I use The Eddy Duchin Story as a motif in the book. I also love to draw from popular and classical music. I imagine my characters listening to music or playing music as if it becomes a score to a particular scene. I also listen to music myself when I am writing. I might play the same piece of music for days which is a way to get me into the frame of mind to write. I am also a fashion buff (I wanted to be a dress designer when I was a teenager, but I couldn’t sew). Fashion styles are very important, and I use changing fashion to mark the passage of time. 

 Do you have another novel in mind? 

Right now I am working on a big Southern novel with someone so I don’t have the bandwidth to write my own novel for at least a year, but I have been playing around with a novel set in France that is a love story of sorts. It’s based on something I experienced, and it has stuck with me. I happen to have lots of letters that went back and forth between myself and a man who was living in Paris. It might turn into a novel. We’ll have to see. 

Any advice for a writer thinking about writing a novel? 

Start with a scene that has a lot of heat on it – by that I mean passion, emotion, drama, and jump in there. You don’t have to start from the beginning – but that scene can be like a pebble in a pond. You can go from that place to all the circles that surround it and one day you’ll have a completed novel. The other thing I can say is that “Rome wasn’t built in a day.” Writing a novel 4 is a long-term proposition so if you want to write a novel be in it for the long haul. If it spills out of you and comes out fully formed, great, but chances are that won’t happen. But it will be worth all the time that you spend. I can’t remember who said that “Writing is rewriting” but it is true.