CONGRATS TO LUCKY WINNER – CARRIE! The San Francisco Chronicle called her debut novel, Midori by Moonlight 1 , a “terrific first novel.” Now Author Wendy Tokunaga is back with her second book, Love in Translation , which again explores the themes of Japan and Japanese culture and being a stranger in a strange land, which have played a major role in her life and writing. I now turn the stage over to Wendy, who’s here telling us all about: Love and Songs in Translation As someone whose second novel has just come out, it may surprise you that when I was young, my dream wasn’t to be a writer; I wanted to be a rock star. The only writing I did was songwriting for the bands I put together on my quest to become the next Joan Jett, Blondie or Pat Benatar. At the same time I’d become mad for Japan and Japanese culture and was studying the language. When I heard about something called karaoke, I thought I’d died and gone to heaven. The Japanese actually invented karaoke (singing popular song