A Pale view of the Hills (original 1982; edition 1983)

I liked this story and the style of writing. I was puzzled, though, as to what the story was trying to express. I thought it was going to tell about the narrator's daughter Kikei, but it did not. I had to go to the Wikipedia article about this story to be sure I understood it correctly. I wasn't sure why the story of Kikei was dropped and the story of Sachiko and Mariko expounded. I also had a hard time remembering that Etsuko was in Great Britain and not in Japan. I did feel the recurrent theme of the change in relationship between children and their elders. The lack of respect for elders was disturbing in the way it was evoked in the book. This is a very interesting story and worthwhile read! ( )

Plot summary: During a visit from her daughter, Niki, Etsuko reflects on her own life as a young woman in Japan, and how she left that country to live in Britain. As she describes it, she and her Japanese husband, Jiro, had a daughter together, and a few years later Etsuko met a British man and moved with him to Britain. She took her elder daughter, Keiko, to Britain to live with her and the new husband. When Etsuko and her new husband have a daughter, Etsuko wants to call her something "modern" and her husband wants an Eastern-sounding name, so they compromise with the name "Niki," which seems to Etsuko to be perfectly British, but sounds to her husband at least slightly Japanese.

In Britain, Keiko becomes increasingly solitary and antisocial. Etsuko recalls how, as Keiko grew older, she would lock herself in her room and emerge only to pick up the dinner-plate that her mother would leave for her in the kitchen. This disturbing behavior ends, as the reader already has learned, in Keiko's suicide. "Your father," Etsuko tells Niki, "was rather idealistic at times...[H]e really believed we could give her a happy life over here... But you see, Niki, I knew all along. I knew all along she wouldn't be happy over here."[2]

Etsuko tells her daughter, Niki, that she had a friend in Japan named Sachiko. Sachiko had a daughter named Mariko, a girl whom Etsuko's memory paints as exceptionally solitary and antisocial. Sachiko, Etsuko recalls, had planned to take Mariko to America with an American soldier identified only as "Frank." Clearly, Sachiko's story bears striking similarities to Etsuko's. ( )

I don't trust Kazuo Ishiguro's narrators an inch, so reading this I just settled in and waited for her to reveal herself. I'm not entirely sure what exactly happened in this novel -- I've got multiple interpretations turning over in my head -- but I loved it. The slowly building sense of something not being quite right, the odd moments of disquiet -- the fact that everything is implication works perfectly, for me.

It's not particularly surprising for Ishiguro's work, in that sense: it's very much his usual style and content. I enjoyed it a lot, but I can understand why people wouldn't -- it's quite devoid of content, it's all atmosphere, and even what's there isn't so trustworthy, so... there are no answers here, basically, no resolution, and that can feel very unsatisfying. ( )

Unusual, but striking story ( )

Fantastic book, with a conclusion that I imagine I'll be trying to wrap my head around for days. I will definitely be rereading this book again soon with a fresh perspective. ( )