A review by ida03a
Diary of a Void by Emi Yagi

3.75

Vey interesting concept, but I'm not sure if I actually fully understood it? Is the book  supposed to be confusing and weird or did I just not get it?

It starts out with a woman telling her coworkers that she is pregnant and can't make coffee anymore, as it makes her nauseous, she then goes on pretending and tries to keep up the appearance that she really is pregnant. Then, she suddenly starts to seem like she actually is, and her own mindset also shifts. She now feels real pregnancy symptoms, her stomach grows and she (and others) feel the baby kicking. The baby even shows up on ultrasound at the doctor. But then the mc tells a friend that she is lying about "something" but doesn't go on to specify. In the final pages of the book she births the child and we get a page of "12 months later" of her talking about her son. As I finished I found myself very confused, did the baby exist or not? Still, I kind of enjoy being confused when reading, as it makes me want to read on to understand the situation. What it lacked though was an explanation in the end, was this a woman going crazy and truly believing she had a child? Was it a magical instance where a baby actually was created from nothing? (Like the Virgin Mary?) I kind of think it has to be the latter since she actually felt the baby kicking and everything? Maybe this was supposed to be a magical realism book. Still not sure lol. Because of this, I found the end a bit anti-climactic and expected something more.

On the other hand, I think it was an enjoyable read, the writing style was simple but nice and I could read it fairly quickly. I especially enjoyed learning more about womens role in Japanese society.