The most beautifully written collection of boring scenes I’ve encountered.

Thanks to the publisher and NetGalley for the advance copy.

One of the best educations in life comes from visiting one's extended family alone - that is to say without one's own nuclear family. That's when a different version of the familial origins finds a place in the stories we tell ourselves. Or, in the alternative (or in addition to), one has the opportunity to compare one's own crazy relatives with the "other side of the family" depending on the ancestral branch one is most claiming. This author has wonderfully told this kind of a tale.

Tomoko has been single-parented since she was six. When she is twelve her mother decides to go to dressmaking school and sends Tomoko off to relatives who are well-resourced and willing to bring Tomoko into their home. This is where she and Mina, her cousin, become better acquainted. How can they not, living together? Still Mina is not well, and has been kept like an orchid within the walls of her family compound, and Tomoko begins to take on the job of companion and bosom-friend to Mina. There are definite advantages to this relationship, and unexpected benefits - close contact with a handsome dad, a crazy grandma (German no less - a surprise in this Japanese location), a library, soda pop (family business), and - wait for it - a family zoo in which resides and wanders around - a pygmy hippopotamus named Pochiko.

Mina's Matchbox is told in hindsight, 30 years later, and although the adult voice of the narrator is discerned, the author has not lost the gullible wisdom of Tomoko and Mina's childhood vulnerabilities. Gentle and cunning, she lands a reader into a story of that moment every child has. . .that real sense of scales falling from wide eyes as comfortable family norms and situations are recognized as the not-so-rosy-peculiarities they are. . .with darker complexities perceived - even if all is not completely understood. {Cue the ominous background music. . .}

Yet all is not dark (in fact is not hardly dark, just not so rosy). One of Tomoko's jobs is to keep Mina supplied with books, and so here goes my list:
Anne of Green Gables
Pollyanna
Izu Dancer
Snow Country
Kyoto
The House of Sleeping Beauties
King Arthur and His Knights of the Round Table
The Murder of Roger Ackroyd
The Garden Party
Franny and Zooey
First Love
The Metamorphosis
The True Story of A Q
The Secret Life of Comets
Folklore Beliefs: Agony and Chaos
Wonders of the Night Sky
Secrets of the Comets
In Search of Shooting Stars

A good, steady read when one is looking for two girls in the world, learning about family life in Japan and featuring a little hippo. History has been considered in this book, and some have commented on controversial authorial choices. Those didn't hit me as deeply as they have others. To me it seemed to be more a choice of tying this tale to a particular year. . which was 1972. Could certainly be more than that, but my response can only be that, eh?

*A sincere thank you to Yoko Ogawa, Knopf, Pantheon, Vintage, and Anchor, and NetGalley for an ARC to read and review independently.* #MinasMatchbox #NetGalley

This was surprisingly my first book by Ogawa but I am going to make sure that it is not my last. I truly loved Mina's Matchbox. It was a great coming-of-age, cozy story. And honestly, who can resist a story about a pet pygmy hippo??

12-year-old Tomoko is sent to her aunt and uncle's house in the costal town of Ashiya while her mom goes back to school for the year. While there, she forms a close bond with her cousin, Mina, who suffers from asthma and is often babied. Tomoko is surprised not only by the opulence of the family but also their quirkiness. Besides the obvious hippo in their back garden, each member of the family has their own mysterious background and habits, particularly Mina. Tomoko narrates her time with the family and reflects on the different things that happened while staying there.

If you're looking for a very plotty or dramatic book, this isn't it. Things happen while Tomoko is staying with her extended family, but nothing major. For example, Tomoko and Mina spend several months obsessing over volleyball and the Japanese Olympic team. The book is more a reflection on the formation of their relationship and Tomoko's reminiscence on it in her adult years. There is one sub-plot, involving the mysterious uncle, that I expected to be a bit more explosive than it is.

I enjoyed watching Tomoko grow over the course of the book. Though much of the attraction of the story is in the quirkiness of her family, the heart of the story really is Tomoko's flourishing in a new environment and how that changed her, even as she moved on with her own life. I'd definitely recommend this to anyone who likes a quieter, quirky story.

I ended up loving this - I wasn't sure it would work for me based on the slow pacing but it felt so whimsical and delightful (despite some difficult topics) that I ended up enjoying it a lot!

I couldn’t help but think of a Miyazaki movie while reading this book. A pigmy hippo and two small children among a cast of characters in a large house, it just felt like a Miyazaki vibe. With that said, I didnt love it as much as I was hoping to. I really enjoy this writer and her previous books, but this one is definitely my least favorite in her body of work.

Thank you to Net Galley, the author, and the publisher for an ARC in exchange for an honest review!

For being such a short book, this took me awhile to read. Unfortunately, it's because very little happens. A woman recalls a time during her formative years when she went to stay with her aunt's family. The focus here is primarily on the time she spent with her cousin. While I'm sure others were able to get more out of it, I think I missed the point.

Ogawa is a master of psychological thrillers--she is so creepy in the best ways. Her stories pull you in and leave you feeling crazy. What a great storyteller--masterful.

Sweet and pleasant to read and wonderfully timed with the current Moo Deng hysteria! Her books are all so different and this is a favorite.

A woman reminisces about her childhood and remembers when she stayed with her uncle and his family for two years. Her uncle was a very wealthy executive. Her cousin is sickly and travels to and fro on a hippopotamus. Thus begins this surreal and endearing chapter in her life. Her cousin collects matchboxes, and with each unique book (collected by the driver who delivers soft drinks), she imagines the story behind the pictures on the matchbook.

Endearing story, but it is interesting that the popular book The Memory Police is unique. However, all her books talk about memory and has this wistful appeal to it.

this is a very simple, plodding rendition of a time in a girl's life when she lived with her cousin mina. the match-lighter mentioned above.
not much happens in this, and by the halfway mark i was tired of the idyllic perfection this whole book had in it: mina is perfect, and her house is perfect, and their time together is perfect, and pochiko the hippo is perfect, and nothing changes and nothing is complicated. you have kind of a sneaking sense that something bad might happen, but that doesn't change how one-note everyone's characterizations are.

A lovely little book about the joys and consolations of reading and writing to know and interact with the world. Recommended.

First off, my belated thanks to Knopf/Pantheon and NetGalley for an eARC of this novel.
I have not read Ogawa in a long time.
This is a lovely story, a 12 year old girl from a poor family spends a year at her aunt's home. The aunt has married well (unlike the narrator's mother, now a widow), and the house, and all the accoutrements of wealth, are life changing for her. And then there is her cousin (Mina), one year younger, sickily, and taken to school daily on top of a pygmy hippo! Which was a childhood gift to her father (half German, his elderly German mother lives with them), and lives in the vast grounds of the house, in an otherwise abandoned private zoo.
This is a sweet/bittersweet novel, written decades later from the first person POV of Tomoko. Occasionally her current self will comment on the story, set in the early '70's.
Sort of her sitting down and remembering that year with the family, as she is about to travel to Europe and see Mina for the first time in decades.
Again, it is a rather sweet/bittersweet story, filled with enjoyable stories and empathy - but in the end I did not feel like I had really learned anything new here. I did not feel like I gained any new insight into the human condition.
Yet I am looking forward to reading other titles by Ogawa, something I have been meaning to do for some time now.
3 out of 5.
A pleasant "feel good coming of age for a young girl" read, I suspect great for Book Clubs.

I loved this book. Although there isn't much that happens plotwise, the introspective nature of the book and how life-altering it is for the characters is what makes it for me. That nuance is beautifully done and so is the imagery. Thank you Yoko Ogawa, Netgalley and Knopf, Pantheon, Vintage, and Anchor | Pantheon for this ARC!

Mina's Matchbox by Yoko Ogawa is a poignant exploration of childhood, narrated through the eyes of Tomoko, a 12-year-old girl who goes to live with her wealthy extended family. The novel beautifully captures the bond between Tomoko and her sickly cousin, Mina, as they form a friendship rooted in imagination and storytelling. The novel's setting, 1970s Japan, is both nostalgic and filled with subtle complexities. Ogawa masterfully weaves vignettes of childhood innocence while hinting at the darker realities behind the characters’ lives. The delicate balance of youthful wonder and underlying melancholy creates a captivating, introspective narrative. Overall, Mina's Matchbox is a charming, introspective read that feels both light and profound.

Author Yoko Ogawa finally brings reader's and fan's a new title! "Mina's Matchbox" is coming-of-age story following the life of Tomoko. After being sent to live with her Aunt and Uncle, Tomoko quickly befriends her cousin Mina and they quickly bond. Reader's get to look over Tomoko's shoulder as she navigates her new life and experiences. Oh and there is a pygmy hippopotamus!

"Mina's Matchbox" is a quick and enjoyable read for many reader's!

Thank you author Yoko Ogawa, Pantheon, and Netgalley for bringing us this title!

Mina's Matchbox is the follow up to Yoko Ogawa's The Memory Police, a devastatingly good piece of speculative fiction.

Mina's Matchbox is very different from The Memory Police, it's a quiet contemplative story. Not much happens plot-wise. Tomoko leaves her small village and goes to stay with her wealthy aunt and uncle in the city for a year. I love coming of age stories and this one was top-notch. It sat with me long after I was done reading. If you're interested in character driven stories and coming of age novels, you should pick this one up.

I picked this because I read The Memory Police and really liked it and wanted to read another novel by Yōko Ogawa. I liked this book, it was an enjoyable and cute little story, but not a lot really happened in it. At the end there was an afterward that described how this was originally published serially, and that made the whole thing make a little more sense. I probably wouldn't read this book again and it wouldn't be something I suggest to any of my friends, but it wasn't a bad read and I did like the story.

Thanks NetGalley for providing me with an advanced copy of this novel in exchange for an honest review.

I loved Yoko Ogawa’s The Memory Police, so I was eager to read her newest English release, Mina’s Matchbox. What I read was incredibly different than her previous novel, but I may have loved it even more.

Mina’s Matchbox is the slow, peaceful and quirky story of a young girl (Tomoko) who goes to live for a year with her wealthy aunt and uncle, her German grandmother, her younger cousin (Mina) and their pet Pygmy hippocampus.

Coming from a working class home and town, Tomoko is initially enamored with her aunt and uncle’s large house, paid for with the money made by her great uncle in the soda business. More enchanting than the seemingly forbidden rooms and remains of an on-site zoo, however, is her younger cousin Mina, with her seemingly endless imagination.

Much of the story focuses on the girl’s budding friendship and adolescence. Told exclusively from the perspective of Tomoko, we see how she begins to understand signs of growing up, like first crushes and first bras, while her cousin is still held firmly in the childhood world of the domestic and her own imagination.

There are so many subplots in this story, like Mina’s illness, the uncle’s mysterious disappearances, Grandmother Rosa’s sisterhood with the live-in maid and, of course, the hippo Mina rides to school. Slowly but surely, readers are made privy to the intricacies of this quirky family through Tomoko’s observations as an outsider welcomed into the home.

Mina’s Matchbox isn’t so much plot driven, and the various sub-plots serve less to contribute to an overall theme, but rather to build an overall mood in this slice-of-life novel. Because I could never tell where it was going, it felt like the story progressed slowly and peacefully. It was a nice break from some of the stranger, more unhinged fiction I tend to read 😅

If you’re looking for a lovely pallet cleanser of a novel, with restrained storytelling and heartfelt characters, I’d recommend Mina’s Matchbox.

This was a pleasant glimpse into the main character's one year away from home. Tomoko gets to experience a whole new world at her cousin's side. She is enamored with her aunt and uncles mansion, her new best friend, and the family pygmy hippo. It's a pleasant read, fairly light in topics, and the character stayed with me for a while after.

Yoko Ogawa? She writes it, I WILL READ IT. When I read The Memory Police, that absolutely changed the trajectory of my journey as a reader. Whatever Ogawa put in that novel, I wanted and NEEDED. When I found out that a new book of hers was coming out, Mina's Matchbox, I ran my happy little fingers over to netgalley to beg for an ARC. I got it, I read it and ...... I LOVED it!

Mina's Matchbox is a coming of age, tale of girlhood at it's finest. Tomoko is a twelve year old girl who leaves Tokyo and travels to Ashiya to stay with her aunt's family. Her aunt's family and home are full of interesting people and this is a whole new world for our main character. At first everything seems so enchanting, but as time passes, Tomoko realizes that there are so many secrets in his new world she has entered. I think its a delightful story. Thank you so much for this ARC.