Natsume Sōseki's - Light and Darkness

This final and unfinished work of Sōseki has been a refreshing read for me. Despite having a simple premise and plot through the story, what makes this story a tour de force is how it delves into the thoughts and feelings that the characters had in their interaction with each other and the inner turmoil they face in handling these often delicate social situations. It is, as many of these great Japanese works are, done justice by the english translators which make these great gems of Japanese literature available to non-Japanese speaking people like me. A little intolerant of verbose prose that requires reading and re-reading just to grasp the idea of a single sentence, these translated Japanese novels appeal to me because the english used is simple, yet succinct. It is a pity that Sōseki didn't live to complete the novel, though besides to give a sense of fulfilment which comes with the completion of a story, would probably have served little purpose in this story, since the point was not really about the story per se in the first place.