Stories by currently noteworthy Japanese women writers, published in the 1980's, and now available for the first time in translation. Written during a period of transition, these pieces reflect women's responses to a time of both positive and negative changes. Women are accepted in the workforce, their sexuality is acknowledged, yet these benefits have a price: families are dislocated, children suffer, and important traditions are lost. In Mizuko Masuda's ``Sinking Ground,'' a 30-ish administrator has tried to impose a rigid order on her life but finds that ``a bag of memories is not as sturdy as one might think.'' Another independent woman, an artist, finds new creative vitality (in Eimi Yamada's ``When A Man Loves A Woman'') when she has an affair with a beautiful younger man. Two stories—``The Rain at Rokudo Crossroad,'' by Kazuko Saeguso, and ``Candle Fish,'' by Minako Ohba—despite their references to old legends, describe contemporary married women trying to attain a measure of independence. These varying concerns all come together in the especially accomplished ``A Family Party'' by Hikari Agata. A daughter-in-law organizing a family get-together in a new hotel built on the site of their old home recalls how her in-laws sold their land and moved to a suburb, where her father-in-law seemed lost: ``We thought that as long as he could continue his work he would be happy. We were wrong.'' Then when he is killed in an accident, ``We talked about his death as a consequence of his dementia, we knew he had been feeling guilty for selling the land that he had inherited from his ancestors....Even so, what could we have done?'' The old and the new converge, and the result is understandably less-than satisfactory. A notable collection—to be read not only for its insights into the lives of contemporary Japanese women but for the very good writing here.
Pub Date: Oct. 15, 1991
ISBN: 1-879679-00-0
Page Count: 168
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 1991
BOOK REVIEW
Wacky plot keeps the pages turning and enduring schmaltzy romantic sequences.
Sisters work together to solve a child-abandonment case.
Ellie and Julia Cates have never been close. Julia is shy and brainy; Ellie gets by on charm and looks. Their differences must be tossed aside when a traumatized young girl wanders in from the forest into their hometown in Washington. The sisters’ professional skills are put to the test. Julia is a world-renowned child psychologist who has lost her edge. She is reeling from a case that went publicly sour. Though she was cleared of all wrongdoing, Julia’s name was tarnished, forcing her to shutter her Beverly Hills practice. Ellie Barton is the local police chief in Rain Valley, who’s never faced a tougher case. This is her chance to prove she is more than just a fading homecoming queen, but a scarcity of clues and a reluctant victim make locating the girl’s parents nearly impossible. Ellie places an SOS call to her sister; she needs an expert to rehabilitate this wild-child who has been living outside of civilization for years. Confronted with her professional demons, Julia once again has the opportunity to display her talents and salvage her reputation. Hannah (The Things We Do for Love, 2004, etc.) is at her best when writing from the girl’s perspective. The feral wolf-child keeps the reader interested long after the other, transparent characters have grown tiresome. Hannah’s torturously over-written romance passages are stale, but there are surprises in store as the sisters set about unearthing Alice’s past and creating a home for her.
Wacky plot keeps the pages turning and enduring schmaltzy romantic sequences.Pub Date: March 1, 2006
ISBN: 0-345-46752-3
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2005
A strict report, worthy of sympathy.
A violent surfacing of adolescence (which has little in common with Tarkington's earlier, broadly comic, Seventeen) has a compulsive impact.
"Nobody big except me" is the dream world of Holden Caulfield and his first person story is down to the basic, drab English of the pre-collegiate. For Holden is now being bounced from fancy prep, and, after a vicious evening with hall- and roommates, heads for New York to try to keep his latest failure from his parents. He tries to have a wild evening (all he does is pay the check), is terrorized by the hotel elevator man and his on-call whore, has a date with a girl he likes—and hates, sees his 10 year old sister, Phoebe. He also visits a sympathetic English teacher after trying on a drunken session, and when he keeps his date with Phoebe, who turns up with her suitcase to join him on his flight, he heads home to a hospital siege. This is tender and true, and impossible, in its picture of the old hells of young boys, the lonesomeness and tentative attempts to be mature and secure, the awful block between youth and being grown-up, the fright and sickness that humans and their behavior cause the challenging, the dramatization of the big bang. It is a sorry little worm's view of the off-beat of adult pressure, of contemporary strictures and conformity, of sentiment….
A strict report, worthy of sympathy.Pub Date: June 15, 1951
ISBN: 0316769177
Page Count: -
Publisher: Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: Nov. 2, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 1951
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
APPRECIATIONS
© Copyright 2024 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
bookshelf
