Richard Lloyd Parry

“The families of the missing are doubly burdened: first by the pain of their ordeal, and then by our expectations of them, expectations of a standard of behavior higher than we require of ourselves.”

Lucie Blackman was a twenty-one year old British woman, who had recently moved to Tokyo, with her best friend. In the summer of 2000, she suddenly vanished. A massive manhunt ensued. Seven months later, her dismembered body is found entombed in a seaside cave. What happened to this pretty, show more vivacious, young woman? If the reader can handle the disturbing nature of this true crime nightmare, there is plenty to sink your teeth into here, with a complex narrative, along with plenty of twists and turns. The author, an award-winning British journalist, followed this case, from the very beginning and had close contact with everyone involved, including the demoniac killer.
Once again, be forewarned- this is a creepy, unsettling exploration of pure evil, but it is also first rate nonfiction. I highly recommend it.

*I also highly recommend the audio, narrated by the wonderful Simon Vance. show less

‘’By the time the party came to an end, it was already becoming cloudy, but there was no wind. Not a single leaf was moving on the trees. I couldn’t sense any life at all. It was as if a film had stopped, as if time had stopped. It was an uncomfortable atmosphere, not the atmosphere of an ordinary day.’’
Sayomi Shito

Friday, 11 March 2011. A 9.1 earthquake strikes Japan, 70km east of the Oshika Peninsula of Tohoku. Its duration? 6 minutes. It was the most powerful earthquake ever in show more the country, triggering severe tsunami waves. The result? 15, 899 deaths, 6, 157 injured, 2, 529 people missing. It caused nuclear accidents in the Fukushima Nuclear Power Plant and reminded us that we are the tiniest specks of dust when Nature decides to confront us. This exceptional book by Richard Lloyd Parry describes the aftermath of the nightmare, centred around the tragic loss of 74 children and 10 teachers of the Okawa Elementary School.

‘’Do you know the number of missing children in each class, Headmaster? Without looking at that piece of paper. You don’t, do you? You have to look at your piece of paper. Our kids - are they just a piece of paper? You don’t remember any of their faces, do you?’’

From the very start of his chronicle, Lloyd Parry makes the readers feel as if they’re actually experiencing every step of the terrifying disaster. The descriptions of how he experienced the earthquake in Tokyo are extremely vivid and frightening. We have constant earthquakes here in Greece, and as a resident of Athens, I have experienced quite a few strong ones, but I can never get used to the phenomenon. I simply can’t. To go through an incident of this magnitude and duration is unimaginable. However, the actual terror and despair come later, in the aftermath of the disaster and the victims of the tsunami.

‘’-Itte kimasu.’’
‘’-Itte rasshai.’’

How can one describe the agony of the parents who didn’t know their children’s whereabouts? Their unimaginable pain? Their despair of not having bodies to bury and find some form of closure? It is often unbearable to read. From the strange quietness experienced by the mothers, preceding the nightmare, to the frantic search in the mud and debris, the reader is required to have a strong stomach. Where children are concerned, every sense of detachment simply vanishes. Yet, the way the writer narrates the experiences is sensitive, careful and deeply respectful. There is no shock-mongering, no vulgarity. Everything is handled with the utmost care and sincerity, but still, it is impossible not to yield in the face of the horror. A horror caused by nature and humans alike in a nightmarish fellowship, because of the negligence, the criminal incompetence that cost the lives of children and the ordeal of waiting for your son and daughter to be washed ashore in whatever condition...Japan was the last country I’d expect this to happen, but it did, and this shows us that no one is immune to wrong decisions and stupidity.

‘’[Tohoku] is associated with an impenetrable regional dialect, a quality of eeriness and an archaic spirituality that are exotic even to the modern Japanese. In the north, there are secret Buddhist cults, and old temples where the corpses of former priests are displayed as leering mummies. There is a sisterhood of blind shamanesses who gather once a year at a volcano called Mount Fear, the traditional entrance to the underworld.’’

Stories of children’s bodies shedding tears of blood. Priests who exorcised the spirits of the ones who met a tragic death and chose to reside in the bodies of the living, in search of a connection with our world and, possible, with a sense of justice. Hauntings were reported in the towns, at home, on the beaches. Young and old spirits, silhouettes covered in mud. Frightening dreams, unsettling feelings, possessions, dark figures, disembodied eyes. Lloyd Parry narrates the otherwordly experiences, the spiritualistic history of Tohoku, the destroyed graveyards, temples and household altars, the presence of the gaki, the hungry ghosts of the vast Japanese tradition. These parts of the book make it so unique, so powerful and one of those works that haunt you and stay with you forever.

Along with the chronicle of the disaster, the writer inserts facts about his gradual familiarization with Japanese culture and daily life, the patriarchy that is present even in the aftermath of terror, the political games of power. It is a dark journey for the reader, you will walk down the path with a heavy heart but it is a route we need to follow to understand how insignificant we are against Mother Nature, to change our ways, to start thinking clearly. Or just start THINKING, because it seems we are incapable of even that…

‘’Once the water has retreated, how much did you have left? [...] When you’ve got the truth in your hand, what are you going to do with it?’’

My reviews can also be found on https://theopinionatedreaderblog.wordpress.com/ show less

A reasonably engaging and incredibly detailed recounting of the disappearance of Lucie Blackman, a young British woman working as a hostess in Tokyo's seedy Roppongi district. There's something pretty exploitative about the whole true crime genre, and I did wonder halfway through why I was reading this - what does anyone gain from rehashing the grisly details of what turns out to be a pretty tawdry and deeply depressing story? I'm not sure. Parry does a good job of providing some cultural show more context for the crime, its investigation and the eventual trial of the perpetrator, but I came away feeling saddened and a bit cheapened. I guess I'm just not really a true crime type of guy. show less

An astoundingly detailed account of the 2011 tsunami in Japan that concentrates on the destruction of a coastal village elementary school and the 74 children who were lost. I won't be able to do this review justice because it's hard to explain how deft the author was at slowly revealing the layers of this tragedy in brilliant prose. After the wave takes these children, the agony of the parents' lives going forward are breathtaking: the mother who learned to operate an excavator so she could show more continue looking for her child after the officials have given up; the young boys who tried to convince their teacher that they needed to run up the hill to get away from the coming disaster; the terrible disaster planning on the part of the school and the apparent negligent behavior of the principal during and after the wave; and the second guessing on the part of parents who failed to go pick up their children before the tsunami hit. Incredible reportage by a prose master who also made the Japanese culture understandable. Just an absolutely brilliant book that is also astoundingly sad. show less