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emjil 's review for:
Convenience Store Woman
by Sayaka Murata
This was a quick and easy read, and I have mixed feelings about it. Our main character, Keiko, lacks social grace and has a hard time understanding others’ emotions. It is implied that she has some sort of developmental disorder that stunts her ability to understand others and understand social cues. Still though, she has sharp observational skills: she is keenly aware of how her speech is influenced by the people around her: “infecting each other like this is how we maintain ourselves as human is what I think.” She is able to identify resentment as projection: “maybe people who thought they were being violated felt a bit better when they attacked other people in the same way.” She is able to observe her social interaction from the outside and analyze them accordingly.
Keiko struggles with the expectations of a “normal” life. It seems like her friends, family, and society at large want her to get better job, or get married and have kids. Keiko rejects this sort of conformity and embraces what she calls her convenience store animal instinct.
There are contours of anti-capitalist ideas – Keiko talks about being just another cog in a machine, about how she has to keep her body well-oiled in order to do her job, and she admits that she has her “human” life and her “convenience store staff” life. But I don’t think "Convenience Store Woman" really functions as a critique of capitalism. If anything, Keiko gains self-worth, independence, and meaning from her rote nine-to-five. In fact, she uses this identity – a “worker” devoid of humanity – to reject the conformist culture that demands more from her. I think Keiko as a character doesn’t really work as the subject of a capitalist critique (although I don’t even know if that’s what Murata was going for.)
I didn’t think this was a funny or quirky or lighthearted novel, like others have said. Only one part made me chuckle. Keiko’s sister comes to Keiko’s apartment, with concern for her. “She kept crying uncontrollably without responding to my request. Lost for something to do I took a custard pudding out of the refrigerator and ate it as I watched her sitting there sobbing.” But even that scene is colored by the tragedy of a woman who struggles to feel human, and her family who doesn’t know how to help.
Keiko struggles with the expectations of a “normal” life. It seems like her friends, family, and society at large want her to get better job, or get married and have kids. Keiko rejects this sort of conformity and embraces what she calls her convenience store animal instinct.
There are contours of anti-capitalist ideas – Keiko talks about being just another cog in a machine, about how she has to keep her body well-oiled in order to do her job, and she admits that she has her “human” life and her “convenience store staff” life. But I don’t think "Convenience Store Woman" really functions as a critique of capitalism. If anything, Keiko gains self-worth, independence, and meaning from her rote nine-to-five. In fact, she uses this identity – a “worker” devoid of humanity – to reject the conformist culture that demands more from her. I think Keiko as a character doesn’t really work as the subject of a capitalist critique (although I don’t even know if that’s what Murata was going for.)
I didn’t think this was a funny or quirky or lighthearted novel, like others have said. Only one part made me chuckle. Keiko’s sister comes to Keiko’s apartment, with concern for her. “She kept crying uncontrollably without responding to my request. Lost for something to do I took a custard pudding out of the refrigerator and ate it as I watched her sitting there sobbing.” But even that scene is colored by the tragedy of a woman who struggles to feel human, and her family who doesn’t know how to help.