Book review, from Tokyo – Ever wonder just how long is two minutes? 120 seconds. 1/30 of an hour. 1/720 of a day. Not very long is it?

My daughter picked up 『二分間の冒険』(Jun Okada, 1985; Nifun kan no bouken, lit. A two-minute adventure) from her school library, and it took us almost two months to finish. Well, there was the two-week return deadline and the new sanitization process, which prevented her from renewing it again immediately. So when she finally got her hands on it, we got to the end of this modern classic that is still popular with children (and has remained in print).

No wonder.

Imagine meeting a talking black cat, being invited to spare two-minutes for a game and warped into a fantasy world for it. That’s what happened to Satoru, a 6th grader who used his wits to escape the chore of preparing for a movie screening in the school’s multipurpose hall.

Drawn into a game on hide-and-seek with the cat that called itself dare ka (somebody), Satoru has to find the one sure thing in order to return to the real world. So here he was forced to call upon his wits to save himself.

Somebody didn’t mention a dragon. So when Satoru stumbled onto a strange village of children and unwittingly agreed to be dragon feed, he was paired with Kaori on what seemed a doomed journey north to the dragon manor. Smart and kind, not unlike a girl of the same name he knew from the other world, Kaori guides them faithfully to their destiny.

What did all this have to do with finding the one sure thing? He didn’t know, but he didn’t know how else he could proceed. So he went along and met the fearsome riddle-loving magic dragon. Satoru arrives at the answer, eventually. But not after finding a whole lot of other things. Fear. Courage. Affection. Solidarity. Friends. Victory. Joy. Sadness. All that in two magical, excruciating minutes.

More than 30 years on, this two-minute adventure has found another fan. And I’m quite sure it will mesmerize many more even if they didn’t like talking cats, old manors, magic dragons and perplexing riddles.

Title: 『二分間の冒険』 (Nifunkan no bouken, lit. A two-minute adventure)
by Jun Okada, illustrated by Daihachi Ota
Publisher: Kaisei-sha, Ltd., 1985