Bokrecension: Across the nightingale floor, Över näktergalens golv av Lian Hearn

Nedanstående innehåll är skapat av Mimers Brunns besökare. Kommentera arbete

Detta arbete fick jag MVG på. Läs och njut.

Difficult. Long. Great.


The book is about a guy called Takeo (Tomaso), living in a village with the banned The Hidden-clan. One day the mightiest emperor of the Three Countries, Iida Sadamu, is coming to eliminate the whole Hidden-clan. He slaughters all the people, only Takeo (or Tomasu as he was called at that time) survives. When he gets hunted by Lord Iidas underlings, on his getaway, he bumps into Otori Shigeru. He, after a long trek, proves to be a beloved emperor of the Middle country in current Japan. When they gets to Hagi (the capitol of the middle country) Takeo is trained to be an assassin to make his revenge and kill Lord Iida.

I think the book is called "Across the nightingale floor" because Lord Iida is lying on a nightingale floor (that is a magic floor that only a few people can build. When you walk on it, it sound like a herd of nightingale birds sings) so that assassins can''''t kill him. He''''s a much hated man so it’s many people that would like to kill him. And Lord Otori (who adopts Takeo) makes a nightingale floor himself so that Takeo can practise crossing it without a sound. Finally he makes it and is ready to kill Lord Iida. With his special powers (later in the book you will find out that he got them from his dad, because he was of the Tribe-clan, a small group of people that lives in The Middle Country and are shaped a little bit special (a straight line across the palm) and has the ability to “split in two” and turn invisible, and Takeo also gets the attributes to hear like a cat and walk very silent) he thinks he can kill Lord Iida and still get out of the castle alive. It was not so hard to understand why it was called “Across the nightingale floor” when you’ve read it. You don’t have to be a genius to understand it.

When I first looked upon it I thought “I will never be able to read this in two weeks!”, but since my brother already had read it in Swedish and thought it was really good, I didn’t hesitate to choose it and start reading. And it indeed lived up too my expectations! It was better than I could ever imagine, it was one of the best books I’ve ever read. So I don’t regret that I chose to read it that afternoon after the grammar test.

Once I have been in a situation like Takeo was at the end of the book. That is when he is about to kill Iida. He has got a lot of people’s lives on his shoulders. And if he doesn’t make it all of his beloved friends and idols will get killed and he would think that his life would be useless and he would commit suicide. I was in that situation (maybe not in that scale, but like it), when it was “Footballs day” at “Lidingö Vallen”. It was the last match, the final of my group. We were very even so after a half-an-hour game it was an equal 2-2. We didn’t have time with any “Golden Goal” so we started the penalties immedietly. I was the best goalkeeper in the whole of Lidingö (I was the only keeper playing in the first team), so we thought that we had a good chance of winning. But our other players wasn’t that good.It was best out of three penalties. They started shooting. The player from the other team placed the ball at the penalty spot and went outa the goal. He started running towards the ball, and shot in the top corner, I didn’t have a chance. 1-0 to them. Then it was our turn. Our player shot in the right corner, the goalie threw himself to the left.1-1. Them again. He shot in the left corner, and I threw myself to the left corner. “Yes, this could make us the winning team!”. Our turn. He shot, and it was in again. 2-1 to us after 2 rounds. Their last shot. My heart pounding faster and faster. He shot it in the roof of the net in the middle of the goal. I was just about to throw myself to the right when I saw the ball going in the top middle. So I didn’t move. I just jumped and punched it over the goal. We had won! We had one left, but he just shot it nonchalantly in the middle. I was a hero for my team. They “hissade” me (when everyone lifts a person in the arms and start throwing him into the air. I was so happy.
That I think is quite like when Takeo went into the castle to kill Lord Iida.


I think that the message of the book is that you should always fight back at the injust. Like when Iida raided Takeo’s village, Lord Otori came to pick up Takeo (you never got an answer to how Otori Shigeru knew that Takeo’s village would be raided and that he would flee that way, but that’s a part of the build-up of the book. It’s a little bit based on the mystery, that is a thing that I really like, so that you can imagine some of it yourself.) I’ve learnt that you should never give up (that may sound like a cliché, but the book slowly brought that message to me.)

If I could change something in the book, I would definitely change the part when Otori Shigeru hires a building worker and let him build a nightingale floor so that Takeo could practise to walk silently over it. In my opinion the author (Lian Hearn) wrote too short about a very important part of the book. So when you read it, you will be amazed over how short he made that part. I even got a little bit mad at him, I don’t think he succeeded with that part. The book would have been more perceivable if he had given that key part more space.

If I had the possibility to adress Mr Hearn I would say the following:
Thank you for a brilliant book with an ingenious story! I really loved your book “Across the nightingale floor”, it gave me plenty of lovely reading hours. I really appreciated the mysticism and a very exciting story. I also think that you created the characters very well. I will (if I have time) read the following books “Grass for his pillow”, “Brilliance of the moon”, “The Harsh Cry of the Heron” and am happy to see that the...