Chancellor David Ward selected “A Tale for the Time Being” by Ruth Ozeki for the fifth Go Big Read book at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
The program, which began in 2009, seeks to engage students, staff, faculty, alumni and community members in a reading and discussion experience all centered on one book.
Ward selected the book to fit the 2013 theme of global connections. The book focuses on a Canadian novelist finding a diary from a troubled teenage Japanese girl that had washed ashore following the 2011 earthquake and tsunami in Japan, according to a university release.
The narrative of the book fluctuates between the novelist and the former owner of the diary, which serves to explore the relationship between a reader and a writer, according to the release.
Ozeki is scheduled to visit campus in October to speak with UW-Madison students.