A review by melissagopp
The Night Parade by Jami Nakamura Lin

adventurous emotional informative reflective medium-paced

4.5

While this memoir has been compared to Carmen Maria Machado’s In the Dream House, I found The Night Parade to be a one-of-a-kind read. In it, Jami Nakamura Lin uses Japanese mythology to explore her experience of bipolar disorder, parenthood, partnership, and her father’s death from cancer. Lin describes her memoir as a book-length essay—a form especially suited for uncertainty and wondering. She employs an impressive repertoire of various points of view, including storytelling, third person past, second person present (as if addressing the reader directly), narrating herself as heroine, and monologuing to her daughter. I especially enjoyed how she invokes the imagery of a parade of spirits as she progresses through labor overnight. Lin is a deep thinker. I so relished her reflections and questions throughout. Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the opportunity to read in exchange for an honest review.