Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet: The international bestseller and word-of-mouth sensation

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Inspired by a real event and based on the internment of Japanese families in the US during the Second World War, it is a bittersweet story of the friendship between a Chinese boy, Henry Lee and a Japanese girl, Keiko Okabe. Although this probably would not have been a book I would have chosen to read ordinarily, I found it drawing me into the story of Henry and Keiko. Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet deals with a past event that we've heard about again and again— World War II.

They were just too young for me to think in those terms, and maybe it wasn't intended to be so intimate. There have been countless books telling stories about people unable to live out their romances because of prejudices and politics, and in terms of subject matter, this is no different. I thought it was a really interesting book about a period that's not very often written about, and I enjoyed it very much. Check out this in-depth discussion with author Jamie Ford about his novel, Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet.Going off-topic, why do so many adult children and their parents deny themselves revealing conversations with each other when appropriate? It is incredibly rare to find a historical fiction novel about World War Two that isn't set in Europe! I suspect more families should get a mediator or a family therapist, if that is what it takes to TALK openly. Her parents treat her differently, she cannot even speak Japanese but she is not made to choose between being Japanese or American.

A dual time narrative, set in 1942 and 1986 – in Seattle, USA, with Henry Lee as the main character. Jamie Ford's first novel explores the age-old conflicts between father and son, the beauty and sadness of what happened to Japanese Americans in the Seattle area during World War II, and the depths and longing of deep-heart love.Many online reviewers, who know a lot more about World War II than I do, really zoned in on all the the mistakes about the war. Alas, because of the war and Henry's prejudiced traditionalist father, our two lovebirds are torn apart and end up falling out of touch—despite the purity of their true love. It made me linger on the final pages as I did not want to finish the book and it is one that will stay with me, I look forward to more books by this brilliant author!