Yōko Ogawa

This was like reading Shirley Jackson, but 100x better. One thing I like about Shirley Jackson is how she writes women who are just slightly off-center. The stories in Revenge have characters that give the same vibe, but the stories have more interesting plots and a more concise storytelling style than Jackson's works. Every story in Revenge is about some slightly weird character in some slightly weird situation. It's not full on horror at all, but the stories are meant to give you the show more creeps and keep you a little on edge as you wait to see how they'll resolve. These characters are the type of people you'd love to talk to in a café because they're fascinating, but you'd never invite into your home because they also give the impression that they're a hair's breadth away from losing their shit and stabbing you to death. There are stories that end in murder or include a murder, but they still manage to be rather tame.

I was listening to this on audio and trying to figure out why this collection felt so old school to me and I'm pretty sure Ogawa excluded any mention of modern technologies from the text. If they were mentioned, they were just a blip in passing because I couldn't remember them. And this worked for me A LOT. These stories felt like they could have taken place at any point in the last 70 years. So much of the focus was on human connection and human sensation. And I think it made the unsettling vibes every character was giving off so much more chilling.

The way all of these stories connect is so fucking masterful though and is why this collection is so great though. It really made me want to go all conspiracy theorist with the bulletin board and string to connect all the dots. But it also added so much re-read value to the collection. As you progress through the stories, you learn more about characters you were introduced to earlier on and it makes you want to re-read the earlier stories with this new information. One character in particular, who I only ever remember being called "Mama," appears often and is also sort of meta in that she's a writer who experienced and wrote about one of the stories for other characters in later stories to read about. Ogawa clearly had a lot of fun plotting this out and it is GOOD.

Lastly, the symbolism. I listened to this on audiobook and was so consumed by the stories that I know I didn't pick up on all of the symbolism or meaning in the collection. We get repeated depictions of juicy fruits, decay, food as comfort, torture, aging, and death. But overall I felt this book was a sort of reckoning with aging, loss, and our inevitable deaths. Several times in the story, people lose touch with someone they cared about and receive news that they died all alone and the things they left behind amount to nothing but garbage. The translation of the original Japanese title is "Silent corpse, lewd mourning," which makes way more sense than "Revenge." I suppose there are characters in the collection who technically kill out of revenge, but they don't feel vengeful. They feel like they're losing their minds out of loss.

Biting into fruit is often used as metaphor for the loss of innocence, so watching a strawberry shortcake decay, tomatoes get smashed into pulp on the street, a girl gorge on juicy kiwis as she's wracked with sobs feels symbolic of both growing up and loss. One character even invents a device that aims to help people grow taller but causes so much pain it's akin to torture. Another symbol of growing up and aging. Some people lose and lose and lose and leave nothing behind but a few fond memories. That's what I took away in this read, but I'm excited to give it a closer read in print and see if my thoughts change. show less

I've been duped! All the positive chatter about this book prompted me to pick it up. But be warned: there is MATH between the covers! I don't care HOW many times people tell me, “numbers are your friends”, that does not make it so. Yet this story may be the closest I've ever come to caring about numbers. Because – I LOVED this book!

The professor has suffered an accident that leaves him with a memory of only 80 minutes duration from the time of the accident. A relative has hired a show more housekeeping agency to send someone in to do his meals and cleaning. The ninth housekeeper to attempt the job comes with an understanding heart and a 10 year old son. There must be an untold story in the background of The Professor, for he so enthusiastically welcomes “Root” (nicknamed by the Professor for the shape of his hair resembling the square root sign) each time he appeared, even though he was unable to remember him from one time to the next. Yet, that relationship was so beautifully written, and the main thing I loved about this story.

Told in spare simplicity – the Professor and the Housekeeper are never even named, only the child who is at the 'root' of everything – this lovely little book will steal your heart, especially if you are a baseball or math fan. I am neither, but it ran away with my heart, anyway! show less

“The Professor never really seemed to care whether we figured out the right answer to a problem. He preferred our wild, desperate guesses to silence, and he was even more delighted when those guesses led to new problems that took us beyond the original one. He had a special feeling for what he called the "correct miscalculation," for he believed that mistakes were often as revealing as the right answers. This gave us confidence even when our best efforts came to nothing.” – Yōko show more Ogawa, The Housekeeper and the Professor

Set in Japan in 1992, a single mother works as a housekeeper for a retired professor of mathematics who cannot store memories beyond eighty minutes, though his long-term memory (prior to 1975) is intact. The professor attaches notes to his clothing to compensate for his condition. Fortunately, he learned his academic specialty, number theory, prior to the accident that impaired his short-term memory, so he communicates with others by asking math-related questions and teaching them how to analyze numbers. He is fascinated with the way numbers are interrelated, and mathematics becomes a universal language with which to communicate with others. He was a fan of the Hanshin Tigers baseball team and their star pitcher Yutaka Enatsu, though he believes the older players, now retired, are still members of the team. This love of baseball is shared with the housekeeper’s ten-year-old son, nicknamed Root. The professor, the housekeeper, and Root bond over math and baseball, becoming a quasi-family unit.

This is a story of human compassion, reaching out to others through communication barriers, and easing loneliness. While baseball and mathematics are central elements of the narrative, it is not necessary to be well-versed in either to enjoy the story. It will be necessary to suspend disbelief on a short-term memory loss lasting exactly eighty minutes, as this construct is a plot device intended to provide structure and lessen repetition. The style is understated and elegantly spare. It is a slow-paced novella, with a few meaningful events outside the professor’s routine, and will appeal to those who enjoy character-driven stories or those involving the formation of alternative families. It is not often that Euler’s formula plays a key role in understanding the connections among characters, but this book pulls it off beautifully. show less

The Short of It:

Ethereal and beautiful, tinged with sadness.

The Rest of It:

On a remote island, random objects begin to disappear. Birds, roses, ribbons, etc. The inhabitants wake to a feeling of change yet can’t put their finger on what has changed until they interact with others on the island. The strange thing is that the feeling that the disappearance causes precedes the actual disappearance which is followed through to completion by the inhabitants themselves. So when roses disappear, show more the inhabitants gather up all the roses to destroy them and send them down a river.

The disappearances are enforced by the Memory Police. How they know when someone is holding out is not explained but if someone tries to preserve something that has disappeared, they are taken away. Eventually, when all traces are removed, most of the inhabitants can no longer recall the item at all. All memory of the item has disappeared as well. But there are some who never forget. The memories of these items remain in them, and for some, they’ve even been able to preserve the actual item, such as a piece of candy. As living becomes more difficult and the situation more dire, you can’t help but compare what is going on with Orwell’s 1984.

The three main characters are for the most part, unnamed. Our protagonist, a young woman, lost both her parents and lives a solitary life. She is a writer and befriended by her editor, only known as “R” and a kind old man who knew her mother. The three navigate these disappearances as best they can but “R” happens to be one of the people who can remember and so he must go into hiding with their help. What will disappear next?

This story is beautifully written. I found myself rereading many passages as I went along. The author’s skill at evoking a particular memory is especially wonderful. I found myself mourning all the things we have lost during this pandemic. The smell of a wonderful meal, served to me in a bustling restaurant filled with laughter and happy people. Or I found myself missing movie theatres and that anticipation you feel when the previews roll or the smell of hot buttered popcorn while sitting back to enjoy a really good film. The story made me feel all kinds of things. Yes, it made me a little sad but also hopeful because I am fairly certain that the tangible things we’ve lost during this pandemic are only temporary losses, not like the ones in the story.

The author’s inspiration was Anne Frank’s The Diary of a Young Girl. This makes sense when you consider the hiding that must take place to keep these people safe. The Memory Police is a wonderful read. I have found a new favorite author in Ogawa and can’t wait to read another book by her.

For more reviews, visit my blog: Book Chatter. show less