Have just read Sayaka Murata's novel Convenience Store Woman. It isn't the kind of book I would have picked up for myself, but a colleague kindly gave it me as a Teachers' Day gift and I was happy enough to give it a go. The thing is, though, that I just couldn't grasp what it is about the text that turned it into an International Bestseller, as announced on the front cover in lurid yellow type and won it at least one fairly major-sounding literary prize in Japan. Possibly it lost something in translation?
Actually the idea of having a protagonist who works in a small convenience store and grows a sense of identity based on the routines of her work strikes me as a good one. But I just couldn't see how the flat narrative brought this to genuine life. I didn't smile at all in the course of my reading, though at least one reviewer quoted on the back cover reckons the book is hilarious.
Maybe it's just me. But I suspect it's not.
No comments:
Post a Comment