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A review by snaillydia
Breasts and Eggs by Mieko Kawakami
3.0
Womanhood in Japan. Oof. Loaded subject.
This novel is all about womanhood, examined through the mundane life of a woman named Natsuko. It's split into two parts, one set in 2008 as Natsuko's sister and niece visit her in Tokyo, and the other set in 2016 as Natsuko starts making decisions about her fertility.
The two parts read very differently, which makes sense, as the first was released as a novella long before the publication of Breasts and Eggs.
I thoroughly enjoyed the first part. It was beautifully introspective, but balanced in examining characters beyond the narrator. A few gut punches come out of nowhere, though not in a melodramatic way. I was reading part of it idly in a bookstore, and one moment hit me in a particular sort of way. I walked over to the register and purchased one of Kawakami's other books right away.
The second part kind of lost me. It makes up the bulk of the book, about 3/4s. I still enjoyed seeing things through Natsuko, but the other characters I liked from the first part only had a minor role in the second. I really felt Makiko and Midoriko's absense.
The subject matter was also less interesting to me. The first part is about being lost in your twenties, which is quite relevant to my life right now. The second part explores fertility and the morality of anonymous sperm donation. This is a subject I don't care about as much. It included a lot of characters with different viewpoints going on tangents about their views, which got boring. It was still a heartfelt story, but it could have been trimmed down, in my view.
I know I'm talking a lot about my problems with Breasts and Eggs here. It's easier to write about what I don't like about a novel. However, I don't want to discourage anyone from picking it up! This definitely scratched my Banana Yoshimoto itch, so I recommend this to fans of Kitchen.
This novel is all about womanhood, examined through the mundane life of a woman named Natsuko. It's split into two parts, one set in 2008 as Natsuko's sister and niece visit her in Tokyo, and the other set in 2016 as Natsuko starts making decisions about her fertility.
The two parts read very differently, which makes sense, as the first was released as a novella long before the publication of Breasts and Eggs.
I thoroughly enjoyed the first part. It was beautifully introspective, but balanced in examining characters beyond the narrator. A few gut punches come out of nowhere, though not in a melodramatic way. I was reading part of it idly in a bookstore, and one moment hit me in a particular sort of way. I walked over to the register and purchased one of Kawakami's other books right away.
The second part kind of lost me. It makes up the bulk of the book, about 3/4s. I still enjoyed seeing things through Natsuko, but the other characters I liked from the first part only had a minor role in the second. I really felt Makiko and Midoriko's absense.
The subject matter was also less interesting to me. The first part is about being lost in your twenties, which is quite relevant to my life right now. The second part explores fertility and the morality of anonymous sperm donation. This is a subject I don't care about as much. It included a lot of characters with different viewpoints going on tangents about their views, which got boring. It was still a heartfelt story, but it could have been trimmed down, in my view.
I know I'm talking a lot about my problems with Breasts and Eggs here. It's easier to write about what I don't like about a novel. However, I don't want to discourage anyone from picking it up! This definitely scratched my Banana Yoshimoto itch, so I recommend this to fans of Kitchen.