The Fourth Treasure

Tina Suzuki is a young Japanese-American woman studying neurobiology at Berkeley. Raised in San Francisco by her mother, Tina knows nothing about her father or her family's past. She has always focused on her studies and on what she might contribute to the future understanding of how the brain works. When her boyfriend's calligraphy teacher loses the ability to understand written language after suffering a stroke but continues to create magnificent calligraphic art, Tina realizes that he is the ideal subject for probing into the relationship between brain functions and writing. In ways she never expected, her studies lead her to revelations about her own family.

Juxtaposed with Tina's story is another story, one that takes the reader far from the Berkeley labs to Kyoto twenty-three years earlier. The tale of a married Zen master who falls in love with a student, it brings to life the history and art of the Japanese alphabet, and particularly, of the powerful inkstone known as The Fourth Treasure.

As the dual narratives unfold, they are enhanced with brief passages and marginalia that offer both a complete primer on Japanese calligraphy and a concise, thoroughly accessible course in elementary neurobiology. More than just metaphors or literary devices, the disbars propel the plots in subtle, surprising, and illuminating ways. From the controlled, yet poetic writing to the magnificent illustrations, "The Fourth Treasure" is itself a treasure, a rich and rewarding reading experience, wrapped in a beautiful package.