しずかな日々

A gentle story about a lonely boy who comes out of his shell when he makes a friend at school and goes to live with his grandfather. As the title suggests, it’s a quiet slice of life book. There’s a sense of nostalgia for the good old days, a quiet old-fashioned rural lifestyle that few people still have. I thought the writing was charming and thoughtful.

This book caught my eye because of the slogan, 「入試に出た本」 proudly printed on the obi’s spine. This is one of the Aoi Tori Bunko books from which excerpts appeared on various middle schools’ entrance exams. Some of the other books selected for tests had already caught my eye as being potentially the kind of children’s books that would be enjoyable for grown-ups too, so I got this even though the plot synopsis didn’t look like my favorite genre. And I was glad I took a chance.