I usually like to travel during my vacation time, but this year is a little different. My girlfriend is leaving to go to Canada soon for a working holiday, so I’m mostly going to hang around Okayama.  On Sunday and Monday we went to Ehime – it was my first time there.  We went to Dogo Onsen, Matsuyama Castle, and a few other tourist spots.

Other than that, I plan to catch up on a lot of things at home.  One thing I want to do is finish a book called Light in August.  It’s by an American author named William Faulkner. He’s not well-known in Japan, but in the U.S., his books are often studied by college and sometimes high school students. In fact, I used to read him very often for classes.

My old college professor, who I always visit when I go home, recommended Light in August to me. The setting is a small town in Mississippi around the 1920s, so many characters have a strong dialect. For example, some characters say “knowed” instead of “knew,” or “I reckon” instead of “I think.” It’s all very different from my hometown in New Jersey, so I enjoy reading it.

What about you?  What books and authors do you like?