Winter Rain

*"We fell in love beneath an ashen sky. As the ice rained down on our hearts, we clasped hands, sure we'd make it through the storm, each of us struggling to breathe beneath the coming avalanche. But as the snow melts, our memories of that love will disappear. Some things are not meant to survive through the winter of our lives."*

**Winter Rain** follows the story of Kaorie Sakamoto and Kyoya Okamura, who seem to come from opposite worlds. Kaorie is an eternally optimistic girl who has lived in Korea ever since she was little with her adoptive sister Karen and loving father. Kyoya was born into a wealthy, upper class family as the second son of the head of Okamura corporation, a multinational organization he is expected to inherit in place of his disowned older brother. The two suddenly meet when Kaorie and her family move back to Japan and the two start attending the same school. After being placed into the same class, the two begin to grow closer, and soon fall in love. Two people who appear as different could be turn out to find kindred spirits in each other as they begin to see the inner sorrows of one another. Both yearn for the freedom to do what they love, and thrive off their obsessions with the beauty and adventure in the world around them, with desperate needs to find safety and love within their families: Her with keeping her family from falling apart as her father's illness worsens, and him with attempting to break through the neglectful and resentment that destroys his home.

## Plot

The following is a synopsis of the events that occur in each part of the book. The book is divided into three parts, each one titled with one word.

### Part 1- Snowfall

The book opens with a brief prologue through Kaorie's point of view in which we are given flashes of her mother's death. **Kaorie Sakamoto** mentions how meeting "him" was both fate and disaster, and how deeply it affected her forever. She mentions that most stories are sad ones with happy endings, or happy with sad endings, and she's not sure how her own will end.

The first chapter begins the story, opening with the arrival of the Sakamoto family - made up of Kaorie's father, **Ikatsu Sakamoto**, Kaorie, and her adopted sister, **Karen Sakamoto** - at Tokyo International Airport, having family decided to move back to Japan after having lived in **Busan, South Korea** for the past eight years. While exploring a large mall in Tokyo, Kaorie and Kyoya **Okimura** enter the same store, but a crowd keeps them apart. That night, the Sakamotos, despite living in a much smaller and more modest house, have a warm dinner full of laughter and joy, and celebrate their move with takeout chicken and soda. On the other hand, the Okimura family sits silently in an extravagant, luxurious dining room, eating delicacies, but the atmosphere is cold, distant, and tense. It is the birthday of **Mrs. Okimura**, but no member of the family seems to be celebrating. Mrs. Okimura receives presents from her husband and oldest son in silence - an expensive dress and a pearl necklace - but breaks down in tears after Kyoya gives her a luxurious but impersonal golden fountain pen. She proclaims that there is no love or life left in the Okimura family, and proceeds to storm out of the room, pushing over and throwing expensive furniture. **Mr. Okimura** remains calm and ask a household staff member to take his wife to her 'chamber', insinuating that these tantrums are a regular occurrence. Kyoya remains silent, but fingers a small origami crane in his pocket, which he had planned to give to his mother, but after being scolded for giving sentimental and useless presents by his father, he had chosen to get her a pen instead. Later that evening, Kyoya and his older sister, **Nana**, discuss how different their home used to be. They reminiscence over warm memories with his mother and their brother **Jun**, who is no longer a part of the family, but Kyoya tells Nana to get her head out of the clouds, as things are different now.

The Sakamoto sisters enroll at **Minamoto Academy**, an elite private school, through the aid of Mr. Okimura, the CEO of the company that Kaorie's father works for. Kaorie and Kyoya are in the same class. Kyoya sees Kaorie gardening one afternoon, and decides to paint her, unsure why he feels compelled to do so. Kaorie joins the photography club at school, and finds that she accidentally catches Kyoya in some of her photographs. They first run into one another at the library, where they search for different books in the same isle. Kyoya helps Kaorie find the book she is looking for, knowing the library well since he has gone to school there for years. The book is *Winter Rain*, an old but famous poetry collection. Kyoya is shocked, seeing as it is one of his favorite books and one of the books his mother used to read to him. The two bond over the book,