Craig Mod's Things Become Other Things: A Walking Memoir, about his traverses in Japan's rural Kii Peninsula, is striking and deeply felt. Framed as an address to his deceased childhood best friend, Bryan, Mod's memoir intermingles present-tense observations and anecdotes from his life on foot with past-tense memories from a postindustrial U.S. childhood. As he perambulates historic pilgrimage routes and finds "an unexpected peace in these recondite hinterlands," Mod shares bits of Japanese history from longtime friend John, who messages him every morning before he sets out.
Along with marvelous scenes captured through his camera lens, which are reproduced in black-and-white and peppered throughout, Mod charmingly relates the small moments of his encounters. For instance, he meets an innkeeper and his wife who chant "Get fat!" while feeding him a dinner for four, and eavesdrops on a group of girls who speak like truckers. Mod is also an expert at juxtaposing high and low, such as when he arrives at a Shinto shrine and feels "a collision of realities" when his mind jumps to hours spent playing The Legend of Zelda with Bryan.
Incorporated throughout the narrative--cloaked in a comparison between Bryan's tragically shortened life and Mod's own life--is a critique of how the U.S. handles poverty, education, and social services, which Mod positions as starkly different to his experience of Japan. When he does turn his gimlet eye on Japan, he seems a bit blurred by his entrancement with the country. Nevertheless, this layered and profound memoir shines with care and devotion. --Nina Semczuk, writer, editor, and illustrator