Book Review: Before the Coffee Gets Cold: Tales from the Café by Toshikazu Kawaguchi (translated by Geoffrey Trousselot)

My Rating: 4.5⭐️

“People tend to feel happy when spring arrives, especially after a cold winter. When spring begins, however, cannot be pinpointed to one particular moment. There is no one day that clearly marks when winter ends and spring begins. Spring hides inside winter. We notice it emerging with our eyes, our skin and other senses. We find it in new buds, a comfortable breeze and the warmth of the sun. It exists alongside winter.”

“clang-dong”

Welcome back to Café Funiculi Funicula, where patrons can embark on a journey into the past and/or future as long as they follow a list of rules among which is that nothing done in the past would impact the present or the future and you must return to the present before your coffee gets cold!

“If it is not possible to change the present no matter how hard you try while in the past, then why bother?”

A question that defies rational thought but the answer of which lies in the hearts of those who are grieving for the people they have lost, regretting all that was left unsaid, those experiencing guilt over past actions or words that haunt them and prevent them from leading their lives to the fullest and those who want to see their loved one(s) just one more time.

“We can never truly see into the hearts of others. When people get lost in their own worries, they can be blind to the feelings of those most important to them.”

This time we meet four new time –travelers. We have a man who visits a dear friend who was killed in a car crash 22 years ago and whose daughter he has raised as his own. Her impending wedding evokes guilt as he has never told her the truth about her parentage. We also meet a man, who was unable to attend his mother’s funeral and travels back in time to see her once again. The son hasn’t had an easy life and meeting his mother proves to be a cathartic experience, giving him a new lease on life. A terminally ill man travels to the future to see the woman he loved and to ensure that she leads a happy life and not allow his death to prevent her from finding happiness. The final time traveler is a policeman nearing retirement who meets his late wife on her birthday – a day he missed on account of work- to give her a gift.

With simple prose, endearing characters (old and new) and stories that touch your heart, “Before the Coffee Gets Cold: Tales from the Café” by Toshikazu Kawaguchi (translated by Geoffrey Trousselot) is an impressive sequel. Though I did enjoy reading the first book in the series, Before the Coffee Gets Cold, I must say that this book is an improvement over the first. Not only is the writing more fluid and less disjointed, but the characters are very well fleshed out and the stories are characterized by much more emotional depth and nuance. We get to know more about the café owner and his family and we finally get to know the story of the mysterious woman who occupies the time-travel chair in the café, vacating it only once a day, opening up an opportunity for others to embark on their journeys. Yes, there is a certain amount of repetitiveness (with the patrons being reminded of the rules) but that can be easily forgiven on account of how beautifully written these interconnected stories are. This book made me smile and yes, I shed more than a few tears. I’m eagerly awaiting the third book in the series.

“Life too, passes through difficult winters. But after any winter, spring will follow.”