July 18: Tokyo to Chitose

In the morning, we cleaned up the AirBnB, took the garbage out, and called a taxi to pick us up and take us to Ueno Keisei Skyliner station. We had all our luggage with us and I did not relish negotiating the subway with 2 kids and the bags. At the Keisei station, we found the automated lockers, and to my surprise, all our luggage could fit into 1 big locker.

From there, we could easily explore Ueno park, with the giant Shinobazu pond which had a temple as well as the Shinobazu no Ike Bentendo temple. We walked around the bond and when the temple opened looked around. Buddhist temples in Asia can be somewhat commercial. For instance, this one sold blessings as well as lucky charms of all sorts, including charms to protect you when you’re riding your bicycle, carry a fetus to infancy safely, etc. I knew all that, having grown up in Singapore and having had my mom make me carry one of those charms, but I’d forgotten about these and it was fun to see the Japanese take on them.

The kids wanted to go to the Pokemon Center DX, and we timed it so that we would get there just when it opened. Xiaoqin was fed up with subways, so decided to stay and explore Ueno Park’s environs. When we got to the Pokemon Center building, we realized we should have timed it to be there half an hour before it opened. That’s because there was already a line out the door! It turned out that the Pokemon Center was on the 5^th floor, and had 2 dedicated elevators that we had to line up for (no, there was no cutting the line for those of us who were willing to climb 5 flights of stairs). The line moved at a reasonable pace, and while in line we got to see various costumes and dressed up characters. People obviously treat these Pokemon Center visits with far more seriousness than I would have!

We got to the Pokemon Center at 11:00, too late to sign up for any “meet the Pokemon” events that wouldn’t cause us to miss our 4:30pm flight to Sapporo. Boen loaded up on more stuffed animals, including a last minute purchase to hit the 5000 yen tax free limit. We then walked to a highly rated Ramen place, stopping along the way at a drugstore to buy nail clippers. After that, we took a ride back to Ueno Keisei and stopped by the subway central station to turn in our subway cards and get our deposits back.

We then met up with Xiaoqin, though not before the kids became totally captivated by a trained monkey performance right at the park entrance. The park was having a Thai festival, but when I sampled the food it was horrible. Completely not authentic as far as Thai food was concerned, so I’m happy we had the ramen instead.

I had pre-purchased the Skyliner tickets the day before—as tourists you get a special discount. I had even enrolled in the facial recognition system but decided I didn’t want any more hassle. So after grabbing our luggage from the locker, we walked to the Keisei ticket counter and I showed the human there our QR code. The advantage of doing so was that they automatically knew we were going to the airport, and could tell us when the next train left and which gate to go to! This saved us tons of time lining up for the machines, exchanging the QR code for paper tickets (which were required anyway), and then scratching our heads in front of the departure display wondering which train was next. Humans for the win!

Arriving at Nartia Terminal 1, we walked over to the peach airlines automated check-in counter only to discover that we had arrived about half an hour too early to check-in. Clearly, I had allowed too much buffer than we actually needed. That was OK. We got to use bathrooms and relax a bit before our time came up. Indeed, at precisely 90 minutes before the scheduled flight time, I was allowed to check-in at the machine, and a group of very punctual Japanese people had started lining up at the machines.

The machine gave you a paper ticket, and then we walked over to the baggage drop, where we had to get our luggage weighed and tagged before giving it to the Peach airlines assistants, who were very helpful. We could then go through security and walk through the gate. What astonished me was that at no point in the process were we asked to show our IDs or passport. There weren’t even spot checks. Basically, domestic flights are treated the same as train rides. No ID or passport is necessary, and your QR code let you board the plane.

The flight from Narita to New Chitose Airport was uneventful, though we learned why Peach airlines was a budget airline. Rather than boarding directly from a jet bridge, we were taken by bus to the plane, whereupon we boarded by climbing up a ladder. At New Chitose Airport, however, the plane did directly take you to a jet bridge. One thing that Peter Ludemann told me was that the Japanese could board a plane in 20 minutes. This was manifestly not true. Because the airline charges for checked bags, nearly everyone who could pack everything in their carryon was doing so. As a result, the boarding was just as slow as any American domestic flight.

Upon landing in New Chitose Airport, it was raining. As promised, our luggage was amongst the first to come out since we had paid for the “early luggage delivery” option. This meant that we could immediately walk to the Budget/AVIS car rental counter, where the lady in charge said, “OK, you were the last ones we were waiting for, follow me and we’ll get the bus to take you to the car rental depot!”

When I booked our car, it was for a Honda Fit. To my disappointment, we were given a Toyota Aqua, which the car rental customer service agent told us was as spacious as a Honda Fit. I later found that that the Aqua is essentially sold in the USA as the Prius C. It had a 1490cc 3 cylinder engine paired with a tiny 1 kWh battery pack. The car couldn’t even pretend to be an EV for more than 3km, and up any kind of grade screamed like a cat getting dragged into a bath despite our family being lighter than most. We could fit all our luggage in the trunk, and the gas tank was also a miniscule 9.5 gallon, but we could get about 800km of range per tank, so overall it wasn’t a bad car. It was a far cry from the Volvo EX30 we had rented in Geneva, but given the paucity of charging stations in Hokkaido it was just a well that we weren’t offered an EV!

Driving out of the car rental station, it was raining, but rather than heading straight to our hotel, we needed get dinner as it was already 7pm. We had found Tamafuji, which was a Tonkatsu restaurant. The portions were generous and we quickly discovered that paying more than the cheapest items on the menu actually got you worse tasting food! The food was satisfying. We then drove over to SMA Inn to spend the night. To our surprise, this wasn’t a motel, but a bunch of shipping containers dropped onto a parking lot and outfitted with bathrooms, showers, beds, and a kitchenette. To save on costs, there was no staff, but you would walk in, and get your identity verified by a remote worker, who would then give you a code so you could check into your room, uh… container!

The facilities were very complete, however, including AC if we needed it (which we didn’t, given the rain), and despite the noise of raindrops on the container roof, we were able to sleep through the night.

Review: Sony A72C2 with Sigma 20-200

 Muyuan Li, who's a much better photographer than I am, told me one day that he wouldn't buy a camera anywhere except in Japan. Well, I was going to Japan that summer, so I asked him for recommendations. He told me that my best bet was the Sony A7C2 with the Sigma 20-200. Indeed, the all-in price of the package in Tokyo was about $500 off the US pricing, and because of the deal I got, I ended up with the Sony 28-60 lens as well. To be honest, however, I should have just bought the package in the US prior to going to Europe and forgone the savings, because the Alps is so much prettier than Japan and when I look at the photos I got out of the Ricoh GR3, I think I should have just had a better camera while I was in Europe.

In the past, I've always avoided super-zooms, since they had a reputation for low image quality. The modern approach (which the Sigma 20-200 uses) is to not worry about distortion and correct it in software rather than trying to make the lens optically perfect. That allows the lens to stay pin sharp. When I got the 20mm I thought that maybe I wouldn't use the wide end that much. I was very wrong. It turns out that the past 10 years, smartphone cameras have defaulted to 24mm equivalent lenses for their main cameras, and 18mm lenses for the wide angle, so we've all been trained to these lens widths for viewing through the world. If anything, I'd say that a 15-150mm would have been a better fit!

As for low light, the Sony A7C2 is outstanding. In the past, I avoided shooting anything worse than about ISO 400 or so on my digital cameras. For the Sony, I've shot at ISO 8000 with results that still look really nice even blown up on a big screen. Yes, if you want that perfect shot you still have to carry a tripod, but to be honest, the reason for switching out all my old gear for the Sony A7C2 is to reduce weight, and this package delivers.

The thing I had to get used to is the camera demands much faster storage than the older cameras I used to use, so I had to buy a new SD card to go with it. For still photography it doesn't matter much: the camera has a giant buffer and will happily let you shoot while it writes in the background. But if you shoot a video and then immediately want to shoot a still photo, the camera locks up and refuses to shoot any more photos until it's finished writing. If you're a demanding videographer you'll probably need a V60 card. I bought a SDXC U3 V30 card and it's been more than good enough.

The ergonomics of the camera and lens combo is great. The lens has a zoom lock button that lets you clip the camera to your belt using the Spider Holster kit and while you're walking the zoom will not keep creeping longer and longer until it slams against your knee. Yet, when you're in a hurry, and draw the camera into shooting position and start zooming, the lock button automatically unlocks smoothly and you can just shoot! The dials take some getting used to for a former Canon shooter, but I got used to it fast enough.

In short, the A7C2 with the Sigma 20-200 is the package for the active traveler who's not a dedicated photographer. In those cases you want a lightweight package while not compromising on photo quality and you will shoot a lot more pictures if you only have one lens rather than swapping lenses all the time. I still use my Pixel camera for long exposures and in-camera panoramas, because I'm not carrying a tripod. But even in those cases if you can find something to brace the camera against you can get results that are clearly superior to a smartphone's. (Below was a 1.3s exposure, braced against a bridge)

July 17: Roppongi Crossing, Odaiba

 When we planned the trip, I was expecting that the kids would insist on visiting the Ghibli museum. But to my surprise when it came time to book it in June they weren’t excited about it. It wasn’t easy to do so while we were in Europe, and our backup plan to get those booked by a friend didn’t work out, so we ended up with a spare day.

I asked Gemini what a photography oriented morning would look like, and it suggested that Omoide Yokocho Memory Lane followed by a trip to Roppongi Hills. We took the subway to Omoide Yokocho, and indeed, the place was worth photographing. We weren’t night people, but I could see that at night the place would be very crowded and it would be even harder to get a good picture.

Roppongi Hills was much more of a mixed bag photography wise. On the one hand, they were preparing for a Doraemon event, which meant there were Doraemon statues everywhere, giving the place a distinctive “only in Japan” look. On the other hand, the city view tower wasn’t opened until 10am. Disappointed, we walked back out towards Roppongi crossing, and there found that it wasn’t that photogenic either. We noticed that there was a Fujifilm Photo History Museum that was also open at 10am, and walked around the Midtown Garden which was open.

When the Fujifilm Museum was opened we went in. There were huge displays of various cameras, but surprisingly, many of their cheap consumer cameras like the Instax were out of stock. I was surprised but I guess selling cameras wasn’t the priority for the museum. We then walked over to the City View tower and bought tickets to go in. There were two other events going on at the same time. One was an anime art exhibit that was completely sold out, and the other was an escape room puzzle based in the same city view tower! While walking around the tower, we would see groups of people huddled around paper puzzles and trying to solve them. It looked very intriguing but we couldn’t participate because everything was in Japanese.

Lunch was Ramen at the Afuri Roppongi Crossing Gate. This was a chain restaurant that was very popular, but as with all Ramen places, they seated us quickly once we got our orders in, splitting the kids up into another table so they could fit us in in timely fashion. Japanese kids are expected to be much more independent than American kids, but fortunately, Bowen and Boen were happy to eat without their parents watching over them.

Xiaoqin thought it might be a good idea to visit teamLab Planets Tokyo DMM. We took the subway to a nearby station, but it started raining heavily, forcing us to stop by the Gas Science Museum, a free museum run by the gas company. It was surprisingly propaganda light, but also targeted to a much younger age group than Bowen and Boen. By the time we made it to the Tokyo DMM, there was a huge line out the door. We were offered a choice to skip the line by paying $600, or make a booking for 6pm that night. We demurred. I then suggested that we visit the Gundam statue. Boen and Bowen had no idea what it was, but they decided to go for it. Xiaoqin was tired of riding the subway and decided to walk.

The Unicorn Gundam turned out to be outside a huge shopping center. Even to folks who’d never seen the anime, it’s an impressive statue and you could see lots of people taking pictures. Many were carrying “Gundam Base” shopping bags. It turned out that inside that huge shopping center on the 7^th floor was a Gundam fan store. We made it there only to discover that the real hobby shop could only be visited if you have a reservation. We visited the merchandising section which was free to visit without reservations, but didn’t buy anything. After this Xiaoqin joined us and we walked over to the fake Statue of Liberty. This overlooked the Tokyo Aqua Symphony, which played frequently enough that we stopped and watch it! When the symphony was over, we realized we were now close to when the Gundam statue was going to animate, so we went back to see it. That was a complete disappointment. All that happened was the top of the statue moved a little bit. I was sorry we wasted the time and effort!

For dinner, Xiaoqin thought we should visit the Ginza Corridor Street. This street was completely lined with restaurants of all sorts. We ended up walking into the Wagyu Sukiyaki. They asked if we had reservations, and we said No. “We’re full…” said the store manager. Then another employee walked in. “Hold on… Wait outside. It’ll be 10 minutes while we set up.” Apparently with the restaurant fully staffed the manager was now willing to take on 4 more customers! This was a level of flexibility I did not expect from a Japanese store manager.

This was the kids’ first time having Sukiyaki, and for myself, it’d been so long since I last had it that I didn’t remember when the last time I had it was. None of us balked at the raw egg that we would dip our Sukiyaki meat in. The food was delicious, we were hungry, and all that food went into our stomach in less than 30 minutes. When we were done they sprinkled truffle mushroom bits onto our rice and we downed it all. What a great meal.

Outside, it had started to rain again as we walked back to the Ginza station. Fortunately, it had stopped raining by the time we got to our AirBnB stop, and the walk back to the AirBnB for our last night was dry. Back at the AirBnB, we proceeded to pack for our flight to Hokkaido. First, we removed all the packaging—camera boxes, etc just took up valuable space. Then, we reconfigured so that what we needed for the flight would go into a carry on bag, while everything else would go into our checked bag. Finally, we told Bowen to get rid of his worn out shoes. While all this was happening we got the laundry started. We wouldn’t have laundry service when we landed at New Chitose Airport.

Review: The Upstarts

 The Upstarts is a corporate origin story about both AirBnB and Uber. Obviously, Uber has gotten a lot of press, and so has AirBnB (and in fact, I met one of the founders way back when they were tiny), but this book is a b it dated (published 2017), so I was afraid it wouldn't be relevant. To my relief, the book provided lots of details behind the scenes that I didn't know before.

One thing I didn't know was how AirBnB got traction. It turned out that the engineering co-founder Nathan Blecharczyk was a growth hacker (he previously worked on spamming software), and successfully hacked the growth of AirBnB in 2 ways:

While Airbnb has always minimized the impact of these programs, each bore the unmistakable mark of Nathan Blecharczyk. In late 2009, a few months after it had graduated from YC, Airbnb appeared to create a mechanism that automatically sent an e-mail to anyone who posted a property for rent on Craigslist, even if that person had specified that he did not want to receive unsolicited messages. If the apartment was listed in, say, Santa Barbara, the e-mail would read: “Hey, I am e-mailing because you have one of the nicest listings on Craigslist in Santa Barbara and I want to recommend you feature it on one of the largest Santa Barbara housing sites on the Web, Airbnb. The site already has 3,000,000 page views a month.” All these e-mails were identical except for the city, and they typically emanated from a Gmail account bearing a female name. (pg 99)

When that drew attention and they were asked to desist, they played another trick:

 Instead of luring Craigslist users to Airbnb, the company did the opposite: it allowed users to take a streamlined version of their elegant listing on Airbnb and then cross-post it with a single click on Craigslist. “Reposting your listing from Airbnb to Craigslist increases your earnings by $500 a month on average,” the site informed prospective hosts. “By reposting your listing to Craigslist, you’ll get the benefit of more demand, while still being able to use Airbnb to manage and moderate your inquiries.” (pg 101)

What I was surprised by was how sympathetic the coverage of Travis Kalanick was. The book pointed out, for instance, that peer to peer driving wasn't pioneered by Uber, because Kalanick was convinced it was illegal and would be shut down. It was Lyft that did so, yet Lyft never got bad press because the founders never came across as belligerent:

Logan Green and John Zimmer, escorted by Susan Kennedy, also made their way up to the fifth floor. They were earnest and personable, explaining with their usual missionary zeal their goal of filling empty seats in cars. “They always came across as choir boys,” says Kennedy. The CPUC “had to trust somebody when writing new laws. You can’t write in a vacuum, you have to listen to industry.” She speculates that if Uber had been the original advocate for ridesharing, there might have been provisions like drug testing of new drivers, which would have slowed down sign-ups and impeded the growth of the industry. “I wonder if Uber realized what they did for them,” Kennedy says. (pg 203)

Nevertheless, the book does cover what caused Kalanick to get ejected as CEO of Uber, and certainly the acquisition of Otto and defense of Anthony Levandowski was glossed over (my guess was that all that came to pass only after the book was published and the revised edition just didn't get as much put into it).

Another thing that this book does that most other business books do not do is that it covers survivorship bias. Rather than just focus on the genius between those 2 companies, the book covered lots of other startups in the same space but that did not make it. For instance, Couchsurfing predated AirBnB, but was constrained by its non-profit business. Similarly, there were other startups in the taxi replacement services that also failed for various reasons. It also covered extensively Uber's attempts to outpace its Chinese rivals in China, and in fact, at the end when Kalanick gave up he was asked "What made you think you could succeed in China with the government stacked against you?" His reply was unsatisfying, in that he knew it wasn't going to work but he just wanted to try for his own personal satisfaction.

I guess I came to reading this book 9 years late, but it was still surprisingly worth the time.

 

July 16: Tsukiji Fish Market

 

When you get up early, one of the places you should visit is the Tsukiji Fish Market. Nothing else in Tokyo is open as early as 7am. We first had to get Boen his new subway card, of course, but we got to the market at 8am and it was a nice happening place. One motivation was that we had dinner reservations at Kaiya Wakou that evening, and wanted to find the location as the reputation was that it was difficult to find. But once we got to the market we were overwhelmed by the displays of food that we walked several circuits of the outer market, sampling various foods before finally sitting down at a sushi place for some good dining. When we finally found the restaurant’s location the local stall owners told me that the place was closed but we knew that. We just wanted to know how to get to it tonight. Our next plan was to visit the Snow Peak Alpen Outdoor store in Shinjuku. Since we had checked baggage on Peach Airlines to Sapporo, I wanted to buy some really cheap hiking sticks for use in Hokkaido and Tokyo was the best place to get them. Furthermore, Bowen had worn out the sole of his hiking shoes, so we might as well get him new shoes while we were in Tokyo.

On the way to the store on the subway, we had to make a transition at Ginza. Xiaoqin decided that’s worth a visit, so we went out and walked around but before long, both kids were complaining so we decided to split the party, with Xiaoqin exploring Ginza while I took the kids shopping. We’d already had lunch at the fish market, so we visited the Alpen Outdoor store, located the outdoor section. Bowen found Salomon shoes to his liking, and the price after tax was reasonable, so we bought the sticks and the shoes together so we could get the tax free discount, and then went back to the AirBnB.

After having shot with the camera for the morning, I realized that I wanted a fill flash for it. None of the fill flashes at home were compatible with the Sony A7C2, so I might as well buy one. Internet shopping showed a store in Nagano that had it at a good price, and I also wanted a lens cap retainer, so hopped onto the subway to Nagano. A short walk to the store got me the Godox iT32 kit with the X5S trigger and a lens cap with a string that you could tie to the body. The Godox flash was leaps and bounds over the flashes I had for my Canon cameras. Instead of being powered by AA batteries, this unit had its own lithium ion battery, which was like having lithium batteries all the time! That made flash cycling incredibly fast, and it came with a flash diffuser, something you had to buy for the Canon flashes separately! For the price it was an incredible unit. The lens cap with a string wasn’t entirely satisfactory, but I didn’t want to burn more time camera shopping.

I walked into the Nagano mall and I was impressed. This was a beautiful mall that had both indoor and outdoors hallways connected together. So you would walk from Tokyo heat (where much of the food was) into an indoor shopping center. I spied a GEO mobile store, and found both Claire Obscur and Ghost of Yotei for very good prices. They were used but when you’re buying used from a Japanese store the disc looks sparkling clean and I had complete confidence. I bought both so I could get over the tax free limit. The shop employee emphasized to me that once I bought them tax free nothing was returnable. That was fine with me! I also bought some snacks for Bowen and Boen.

Xiaoqin and I both returned to the AirBnB at the same time, and had about a half hour of resting before it was time to visit Kaiya Wakou. Kaiya Wakou was basically a one man shop. His whole schtick is that he will grill shell fish in front of you. Along the way, he would chat, sing, and talk to you. There were 3 other people in the shop when we arrived, and they had been pretty smart, ordering for 2 instead for 4. We got overloaded with shellfish and by mid-way through the meal, Boen was so full he couldn’t eat any more. I myself had had enough shellfish that I didn’t feel like eating shellfish for the rest of our time in Japan! Nevertheless, it was a unique experience!

Tokyo/Hokkaido 2026 Index Page

This past summer, we decided to do 2 trips instead of one, because it was Bowen’s last hurrah before going to high school, where we expected him to get very busy. While my original proposal was to do the Coast to Coast hike in England, both Boen and Xiaoqin weren’t enthusiastic. Boen and Bowen both wanted to visit the Pokemon Center in Tokyo because their classmates had gone there and told them all about it. I figured that now that I was no longer being regularly asked to carry either kid (they’d both become way too heavy) it was time for me to buy a new camera. Tokyo’s the best place to buy a Japanese camera, because there is no tourist tax and there are frequent discounts during the summer.

With that, I booked direct flights from San Francisco to Narita airport via ZipAir. This was
a discount airline, but it had a good reputation and excellent pricing for summer travel. Now, the big problem with Tokyo is that it’s effectively tropical weather in mid July, which would be when we would be going.I decided that the right thing to do was to visit Hokkaido after 4 days in Tokyo, simply because it wouldn’t be absurdly hot during that time. Working off Claude, Gemini, and my previous bike tour in 2009, I decided we would attempt a hiking-oriented trip.

The problem with Hokkaido in the summer is that it’s highly impacted—you’re advised to make reservations ahead of time. So what we had to do was to place our bets as to where to have extra time so we had a chance to out wait the weather, and where to just risk having crap weather and not being able to do much about it.

Certain hikes like the Shirotoko 5 Lakes hike had to be booked far in advance, and having secured those reservations we also made bookings for the Kammuywakka Hot Springs waterfall hike. Asahidake Hot Springs was even at that early stage booked so full that lodging was expensive, so we decided to book an AirBnB for 5 nights in Biei instead. I figured there was plenty to do in Biei, and that a commute to Asahidake Hot Springs was only 45 minutes long, so it was a shorter commute than our usual visit to Mt Tamalpais from the south bay.

I also arranged to visit Drumkan, it being one of the highlights of my trip back in 2009. The brothers running the B&B were now in their 70s, but when I wrote to them they still remember our visit, mostly because of Yana Ivey. Xiaoqin and I decided that for our last night in Japan we would splurge and stay at the so-called “Secret” onsen that was just a 45 minute drive from the airport.

This is the index page for the trip, with links to photo albums and day by day trip entries.

Photo Albums

• Tokyo Fish Market
• Nakano
• Kaiya Wakou
• Tokyo
• Blue Pond and Shirahige Falls
• Biei and Furano
• Chiyoda Farm
• Mt Asahidake Loop
• Kurodake Summit 
• Ginga/Ryusei Falls and Lake Shikaribetsu
• Kitamani Fox Farm and Utoro
• Shiretoko Five Lakes
• Mt Mokoto and Lake Akan
• Mt Mashu, Mt Io & Wakoto Penninsula
• Natai Terrace
• Noribetsu Jugokudani
• Otaki Falls
• Marukoma Onsen
• Narita san Temple

Videos

• Kaiya Wakou
• Biei
• Mt Asahidake Loop
• Kamuywakka Hot Springs
• Kitamani Fox Farm
• Sahoro Resort Bear Mountain
• Noribetsu Jugokudani

Daily Journal

• July 13-14: Prologue
• July 15: Shinjuku and Shibuya
• July 16: Tokyo Fish Market
• July 17: Roppongi Crossing
• July 18: Tokyo to Chitose
• July 19: Chitose to Biei
• July 20: Biei Hot Springs, Lavender Fields, and Furano Roads
• July 21: Mt Asahidake Loop
• July 22: Asahikawa and Shinei No Oka
• July 23: Chiyoda Farm
• July 24: Biei to Suonkyo Onsen, Mt Kurodake
• July 25: Lake Shikaribetsu
• July 26: Suonkyo Onsen to Utoro
• July 27: Shiretoko Five Lakes + Kamuiwakka Hot Springs
• July 28: Utoro to Kawayuonsen
• July 29: Mount Mashu, Mount Io, and Wakoto Peninsula
• July 30: Kawayuonsen to Shintoku
• July 31: Shintoku to Noribetsu
• Aug 1: Noribetsu to Marukoma Onsen
• Aug 2: Marukoma Onsen to San Francisco, California
• Conclusions

Reviews

• Sony A7C with Sigma 20-200

Review: All You Need Is Kill

 All You Need Is Kill is the source novel for the Tom Cruise movie, Edge of Tomorrow. The protagonist of the novel, Keiji, is a soldier in the Unified Defense Forces about to go into battle with invaders from space, the mimics. He fights in a first battle and then gets reset to the beginning of the day. From there on, he gets the opportunity to figure out how to get out of the time loop and how to go about surviving his battles.

The writing style is breezy, easy reading, and occasionally a little dumb. The plot rolls along and we get reveal after reveal, and then the ending kinda sucks, in a completely opposite approach from the way the movie's ending sucks. The movie has a happy ending that's typical of Hollywood. This novel has a bittersweet ending that's typical of Japanese TV shows, but both are similarly unearned. What's interesting is that the movie actually had an appropriate ending only to snatch it all away with a final reset, while the novel itself had a contrived reveal specifically designed to create its bittersweet ending.

The novel is short and at the very least if you try it and it's not to your liking you haven't wasted your time.