Tedorigawa Bookmakers

Ep. 338 Ishikawa Coptic

Bookbinding

This week we’re looking at a 100-page, A6-size, coptic-bound notebook with lines on the recto (right) side and nothing on the verso (left) side. The main difference between this notebook and others is that this book has a collage cover.

I spent several hours combing through a pile of fliers I get in my mailbox, otherwise known as throwaways or direct mail, to find designs, colors, shapes that I can use in the cover. I glued the resulting cutouts to the book board and added a fixative to keep everything in place.

If you check out the Making of Ishikawa Coptic (TDGB 83) on my channel over on YouTube, you can see the page numbers in the middle of the fore-edge, the lines, the finished collage, and the red thread holding it all together. 

By the way, on the cover with the black and white horse, in the lower right hand corner is a partial photo of the symbol of the Kanazawa train station; the Tsuzumi-mon Gate (drum gate).

Fiction

The novel formerly known as The Russian, has taken on a new title to disuse people from thinking it is pro-Russian or anti-Ukrainian. The main character, Dmitry, is neither pro nor anti anything except poverty and hunger; specifically his poverty and his hunger. He’s a scavenger. He finds scraps, bits and pieces, and discarded junk and sells them. 

The novel’s new name is Dmitry, Our Kusuya-san. Or maybe without the Our. There are many words for scavenger in Japanese, few of them polite and most meaning something like ‘he’s garbage.’ Kusu is like crumbs or small things you don’t want; Kusuya is a derogatory word similar to ‘he’s garbage.’ But adding San (Mr or Ms) makes it more polite. Kusuya-san is a scavenger in a nice way.

Dmitry scrounges around until he has enough to trade for a truck-load of vodka which he trades, along with the truck it came in, for a free trip to someplace.

Talkies

First, the video for the making of TDGB 83 The Making of Ishikawa Coptic is up and running on YouTube. 

Second, the casing in of TDGB 77 The Battered Briefcase Case is also up for your view pleasure, as are many other bookbinding videos. Feel free to browse.

Books

The Lonely Izakaya Down a Quiet Street is available on Apple Books for your reading pleasure. A retired Japanese teacher and one of his former high school students meet in Shibuya, Kawasaki, on trains, in coffee shops, and in izakaya where they discuss life, toilets, saké, and the difference between Japanese society’s expectations of men and women. 

It is told in 12 chapters each chapter related to a Japanese national holiday. Except June and December which don’t have any national holidays. Each chapter is divided into two parts: First, the thoughts and ideas of the former Japanese teacher until he runs into the former female high school student (now 36 years old). When that happens, the second part concentrates on the female’s thoughts and ideas; it is longer and covers the two main characters’ conversation.

The Battered Briefcase Case: a Marsh Mystery is also available on Apple Books.

A wealthy Seattlite has been arrested for his wife’s murder. He asks Joe Marsh to investigate, hoping to clear his name. Marsh’s investigation leads him to Xativa, Spain where he discovers both the killer and the love of his life (different people).

All this in 45 action-packed, literary pages. 

 

Ep. 337: A Warning & Mistakes

Bookbinding

I cased in The Lonely Izakaya Down a Quiet Street novella. It’s B6 (which is B5 folded in half), nine signatures, and 125 pages. In making this book I discovered a warning I must pass on to my listeners/readers.

Warning: Keep your fingertips away from sharp objects like exacto knives. Exacto knives are frequently used in bookbinding and, from experience, I realize they cut not only paper, but also human flesh. Fortunately, I did not video-tape the incident.

I made a rookie mistake, too. I measured the width of the book cover using the text block but forgot to reduce the width of the book cover by the space of the hinge. This results in the book fore-edge being TOO big. 

I used washi probably made in Kanazawa for the book cover. It looks nice but is thin. I needed to be careful not to tear it when folding it or using a bone folder.

Fiction

I tallied up the number of unfinished novels I have padding around my house in their pajamas and tattered bathrobes. To be considered works-in-progress they had to have more than 80 pages; I have many ‘novels’ that have only one or two pages.

The total: four. One is from ten years ago. Is it a work-in-progress or forgotten or abandoned? This is Caraculiambro, of course. The giant of a detective investigating a murder, a death (not related to the murder), and land fraud.

The others include an historical fiction about a woman who lives about 200 years without aging past 40 (The Posthumous Autobiography of the Widow Agnes Grout); a dystopian future about a man who survives not only war but also the politics of peace and is part four of a trilogy (The Sound of Fear); a happy novel about a dancer who first shows up in Molly Bright but takes center stage with his own novel that takes place in Italy, the Dominican Republic, and Japan but might end in India (Merengue).

Which one do you think I started re-working on in order to get it off my Work-in-Progress pile? That’s right! I started a new novel about a Russian scavenger who collects, gathers, ‘finds’ what he can, sells it for what he can get, and ends up in a strange land (Japan) by mistake. Tentative title: The Russian.

Talkies

I uploaded an eight-minute video of me casing in The Lonely Izakaya Down a Quiet Street for your viewing pleasure. Search for or click here: TDGB 82 Warning and Mistakes.

Books

The Lonely Izakaya Down a Quiet Street is available on Apple Books.

Former Japanese teacher Shimeki Nagi and one of his former high school students, electrical engineer Okabe Rin bump into each other throughout the year on national holidays and random days. They meet, talk about romance, love and life. They learn about each other, and discover an izakaya owner who writes a manga called The Lonely Izakaya Down a Quiet Street. 

Ep. 336: Lonely Sewing Tutorial?

Bookbinding

Aside from finishing a novella (see Fiction, right below), I printed it out to make a physical copy. It’s B6, 125 pages, and includes the Japanese holiday for each month (except June and December which have no holidays) plus other words (also in Japanese).

I made a cover for the first page, sewed the text block together, and made a ten-minute tutorial (see Talkies, below).

Fiction

I finished writing The Lonely Izakaya Down a Quiet Street and put it online. It’s about 125 pages in B6 format.

Each chapter has two parts. Part One is with Nagi, the old, retired, divorced Japanese teacher thinking about life, and stops when he runs into Rin, his former student.

Part Two is Rin thinking about her life, and continues after she meets up with Nagi.

There are 12 chapters, one for each month of the year. For more about the book, see Books, below.

Talkies

A video tutorial for sewing before casing in. At YouTube TDGB 81: Sewing. About ten minutes.

Books

My novella, The Lonely Izakaya Down a Quiet Street, is available on Apple Books and other online sites. A fifteen-page chapter is free for your reading pleasure.

Rin Okabe, a 36-year-old single electrical engineer working for an architectural office, runs into her old (really, he's almost 80), divorced, Japanese high school teacher, Nagi Shimeki. They meet at random places that neither plan until finally they agree to meet. At first, they are cautious as to why they keep meeting, but gradually learn to enjoy each other’s company.

Other characters include the flirtatious Harumi, the mangaka Tadao, the bar owner Junko, the supervisor Horiguchi, and the unnamed bucho. There’s a touch of magical realism, but mostly life in Kawasaki is grounded in loneliness and separation.

 

Ep. 335 First Draft is the Last?

Bookbinding

Not truly amazing, but nothing this week. I got involved in a gardening project and tuckered myself out. Hopefully, more to come next week.

Fiction

I finished the first draft of The Lonely Izakaya Down a Quiet Street. But immediately found or thought of some changes that need to be made. Please remember that there are 12 chapters for each month of the year.

• First change: A character is introduced in February but doesn’t show up again until November. I want to make him a little more memorable in February so readers will remember him in November. Also, he owns an izakaya and writes manga. His manga hasn’t been published yet, but the two main characters think it is really good. The name of his manga is The Lonely Izakaya Down a Quiet Street. Yes, it’s basically his izakaya.

• Second change: Add a bit more loneliness to the two main characters. Tokyo can be very lonely. Also, the main female character wants to quit her job, which she doesn’t like, move back to her hometown in Fukushima, and open her own design shop. That is going to be a major rewrite.

• Two more changes. ❶ Set up a disease one character gets. Right now it is just sprung on the reader. I’d like it to build gradually. ❷ Humanize a jerk; one character dates someone because he’s handsome and rich but discovers he’s a jerk. So far, in the first draft, the jerk is just a jerk. I plan to make him a little bit more human. Still a jerk, but more human. 

I want to finish this novel soon; at least finish draft 2. And make a cover for it. 

Talkies

Please check out the videos already up on my YouTube channel for your viewing pleasure. While there is nothing new this week, you can still enjoy watching your videos.

Ep 334 Does Size Matter?

Bookbinding

A smaller version of the larger Benengeli’s Zuihitsu. The title combines two important books: Don Quixote (1605) and The Pillow Book (1002). Cervantes claimed the Benengeli wrote Don Quixote. Sei Shonagon wrote The Pillow Book which someone called a zuihitsu.

The smaller version is A6 in size with 9 signatures of four folios each and 144 pages (versus the five signature of five folios each, 80-page larger version).

Fiction

After finishing Benengeli’s Zuihitsu and The Dry Watermill Case, I continued working on The Lonely Izakaya Down a Quiet Street. Perhaps the name will be changed to either The Lonely Izakaya or Kajigaya Sakaba. Why? Because the longer title sounds like a Japanese version of a young adult novel (called a light novel in Japan).

My favorite light novel title is I Want to Eat Your Pancreas written by Yoru Sumino and made into a manga, anime, and live action flick as is often the case with popular light novels.

The Lonely Izakaya Down a Quiet Street is in its eighth month. There are two parts to each month. Part One is the former student’s (Rin) thoughts and life. Part Two is the former teacher’s (Shimeki) thoughts and life. Part Two concludes when the interaction between the student and teacher starts in Part One. 

There is also a bit of magical realism included. One of Rin’s co-workers can teleport through space; no one comments on it. Rin can move things with her mind, often to her unintended detriment. 

There is also a running argument between Rin and her supervisor about the number of toilets in a female restroom vs the number of toilets and urinals in a male restroom. 

Aside from The Lonely Izakaya (which sounds too much like a subsidiary of the travel books The Lonely Planet, doesn’t it?), I started another Marsh Mystery (short private detective stories) titled: The Madrid Murder Case. More on that in the future; if it pans out.

Talkies

For your audio and visual entertainment, we have Benengeli’s Zuihitsu The Smaller Version up on YouTube. Plus other videos you might enjoy. Please check them out, subscribe, and tell your friends.

Ep. 333: A Large Zuihitsu & A Mystery Solved

Bookbinding

Last episode I cased in Our Truckin’ Book but the book boards splayed out as if I had cut them perpendicular to the grain rather than with the grain. This episode, I tore off the cover and repaired it with the proper grain. But the same book cloth so it looks similar.

This week I printed out two copies of Benengeli’s Zuihitsu. One is A5 and one is A6. This week, I cased in the A5 version.

With one experiment that isn’t so experimental except for me. I sliced off the fore edge and I liked it. It made it easier to measure the text block which made it easier to accurately measure the covers. Very useful, although I like the deckle fore edge look as well.

The book cover looks like Italian terracotta roof shingles, the endpapers are a light green, the thread is red, and there’s a colorful chiyogami accent on the front of the book to differentiate it from the back of the book. Clever, no?

It has five signatures and 84 printed pages with five blank pages pulling up the end.

Fiction

Two books were completed this episode. First, Benengeli’s Zuihitsu. A zuihitsu is from the Japanese of the Heian Era (about 1,000 years ago) meaning Following the Brush. Writing whatever the writer wanted to write about. It was coined for Sei Shonagon who wrote The Pillow Book about her life in the Heian court.

Benengeli’s Zuihitsu is similar; writing about anything that fits his fancy, including that Benengeli is mentioned in Don Quixote by Cervantes (written about 400 years ago).

Second, The Dry Watermill Case, a Marsh Mystery. In this episode, Joe and Carmen solve a murder in Seville, Spain and anger some powerful people, so they have to escape to Madrid. 

Talkies

Episode 79 Zuihitsu Large is up and enjoying itself and hoping you can join it. Like zuihitsu in general, it talks about making the book, shopping, music, and new, to me, innovations in bookbinding.

Ep 322: Our Truckin’ Book – Art for and by Us.

Bookmaking

I finished Our Truckin’ Book which is an art book I’m hoping artists will finish. It is 100 pages, A5 in size (half of A4), and blank, of course, for artists to fill up as they wish. Hopefully.

For Our Truckin’ Book to be completed, I need at least one artist’s physical mail address so I can send them a physical ie real book.

The artist will send the book to the next artist and hopefully someday Our Truckin’ Book will be completed. Looking forward to that day.

Also in bookmaking, I finished Benengeli’s Zuihitsu and printed out two copies. One copy is A6 and 145 pages while the other copy is A5 and 80 pages. (A5 being bigger than A6, naturally). The A5 Zuihitsu will be available soon while the A6 will be electronically available just as soon, although it will also be a real book.

Fiction

I finished Benengeli’s Zuihitsu. It has many topics from a recipe for bread, to a murder mystery, to the beginnings of dementia for a cellist, to rants about politics not related to anything going on in the US, to one haiku.

Such is the definition of zuihitsu. By the way, as you might know, Cide Hamete Benengeli is the fictional Arabic historian who, according to Cervantes, wrote Don Quixote.

In other fiction, The Lonely Izakaya Down a Quiet Street is progressing smoothly with a major change or two. First, the male character is getting more screen time. His thoughts about life and death will enter into the narrative; previously, only the female character’s thoughts were being explored.

Second, the name might be changed. The current title looks too much to me to be something called a "light" novel in Japan which British and American publishers call a "young adult" novel. I might change to Sakaba which means a bar mostly with saké.

The Talkies

TDGB 78 Our Truckin’ Book is up at YouTube for your audio and visual pleasure. Learn about contributing to Our Truckin’ Book and about what Kanazawa people (Kanazawans?) call Marubi.

Ep. 331: A Shinkansen Vacation

Bookbinding

I went to Tokyo for four days. Before that, I finished a client’s hardcopy of The Briefcase Case. I presented it to the client in Tokyo. Other than making that particular book, I didn’t make any other as I was busy going to and from Tokyo by shinkansen.

Fiction

I’ve got three bits of fiction floating around my computer and brain. 

One: Zuihitsu. It has two plots that are coming to end soon and when they do finish, the book will be finished. Plot one – a revenge story. Plot two – a crumbling marriage story. The wife in the crumbling marriage was a teacher for one of the mean people in the revenge story. By the way, three characters in The Briefcase Case also appear in Zuihitsu.

Two: The Dry Mill Case. A mystery short story involving the same two main characters of The Briefcase Case in a similar plot: a woman is murdered, they discover who the murderer is, they are threatened by the woman’s family. Also, a similar length; about 50 pages.

Three: The Lonely Izakaya Down a Quiet Street. A 30-something woman meets her high school teacher and they get together over food, alcohol, and life. Not exactly the same as Strange Weather in Tokyo but the same plot but different outcome; written from the third-person rather than first-person.

The Talkies

You can see a video of The Briefcase Case being made at here. With narration about making books, the plot, about the difference between bunkobon and pocketbooks; and a bit about Kenrokuen, a famous garden in Japan that is in Kanazawa.

Ep. 330: The Battered Briefcase Case: A Mystery

Bookbinding

This week in bookbinding I made a quick collage-covered A6, 50-page book: The Battered Briefcase Case: A Marsh Mystery. It is a murder mystery. A man is accused of murder and hires a private investigator to find the real killer. The investigator discovers someone in Spain might have information about the real killer. In Spain the investigator meets his one true love.

This is a short story I wrote a few weeks back. While it has a plot: Who’s the killer? It is more character-driven than plot-driven, meaning, the people are important.

The book itself has a collage cover front and back. I took left over papers and used them on this book. I sewed the text block outside in the freezing cold in the outside of a coffee shop in Higashi-chaya, one of two famous geisha districts in Kanazawa. (See Talkies, below.)

I folded it and put the signature holes in it in a park near a river that flows through Kanazawa city. It was cold but I enjoyed listening to the elementary school boys two tables over. They were speaking a combination English and Japanese as they played an English computer game. 

I made the cover and cased the text block in in my studio where it is warmer and I have all the materials (leftover paper) and tools (scissors and glue) I need. 

An ebook version of The Battered Briefcase Case is available on Apple Books. Or you can contact me to make you a personalized edition.

Fiction

In fiction I’ve worked on two things instead of three. Zuihitsu is rolling along nicely because each day I can add whatever I want; that’s what following thre brush means. However, Zuihitsu has two strong plots that keep it going.

I wrote, edited, and finished The Battered Briefcase Case, of course. Unfortunately writing on those two means once again that Caraculiambro falls by the wayside; perhaps my renewed interest in mysteries will aid it along.

While The Battered Briefcase Case is finished and up at Apple Books, Zuihitsu is closing in on its finish line. I have started another short work tentatively called The Lonely Izakaya Down the Quiet Street but will talk about it later, when it’s more developed; including a new name.

Talkies

TDGB 76 The Briefcase Case is up for your viewing pleasure. It includes scenes from Kanazawa especially the two rivers (Saigawa and Asanogawa), and one of the two geisha districts (Higashi-chaya), and a coffee/tea place where I sewed the text block. Outside. In the winter. 

The book itself is on Apple Books.

Ep. 329: A Bespoke Collage & Tattoo?

Bookbinding

 

This is a120-page, A6-size blank notebook with a collage cover. The important part is the collage cover. As is most of my collage covers, this was an experiment in two ways: first, could I film the process? Second, did it look okay?

Top right is the front cover. Top left is the back cover. Off by itself is the book opened up so you can see both the front and back at the same time. Fascinating, eh?

To the first question: yes, I could film it. If you go to RhinoTattoo on YouTube, you can see and hear the video. It was necessarily a pretty static shot that didn’t show my hands as I worked. Primarily because I don’t have that kind of tripod many collage makers have. Fortunately, much of it is speeded up.

To the second question: It’s up to you. I like it. I think it accomplished what I set out to do. My goal: film a cover collage. What I would do differently is not put on the hazy gauze. The gauze made the book a bit fuzzy, of course, but it was also difficult to glue down, especially the edges. I would also had more pictures.

Fiction

Okay, sad to say this but I’ve been working on three, yes, Three, different pieces of fiction. As a result one has dropped by the wayside. Again. Caraculiambro is once again sidelined while I concentrate on the other two. The most further along is Zuihitsu. I believe this one is tying up loose ends in a satisfactory way. A few more months, I guess. 

The third one, just begun, is The Lonely Izakaya Down a Quiet Street. Here is the plot: a woman in her 30s runs into her retired high school Japanese teacher. Again and again. They talk.

So far, this is the plot of Hiromi Kawakami’s very popular Strange Weather in Tokyo (which has nothing to do with the strangeness of weather in Tokyo). In Kawakami's book, the two fall in love. In mine, they might not. I haven’t finished it, so I don’t know yet. 

My novel has a touch of magical realism, I think. The main character, Rin, can “see” herself in different places with different people. Also, one of Rin’s co-workers can float in the air but nobody comments on it. 

Flicks

Rhino Tattoo – so called because it has a kangaroo on the title page with a tattoo of a rhinoceros – is up on YouTube. It has kangaroo in Chinese. 
There are other videos that concentrate on bookbinding up as well. Please explore, subscribe, and enjoy.