Heaven

Starred review from March 15, 2021
This novel from the author of Breasts and Eggs (2020) takes on another subject seldom tapped in literary fiction and blows it open with raw and eloquent intensity. Kawakami has a unique knack for burrowing into discomfort, and she does it in a startlingly graceful way. Like her last novel--an unsparing treatise on the pressures of being a woman in male-dominated Japan--this book isn't for the fainthearted. Told from the perspective of a 14-year-old boy in present-day Japan, Kawakami's tale follows the volatile lives of two teenagers relentlessly bullied by their peers. At the outset, our protagonist--he's referred to as "Eyes" by his tormentors because of his lazy eye--begins a furtive exchange of notes with Kojima, a quiet girl who's also suffered at the hands of her classmates. Kojima has "stiff-looking hair" that sticks out in all directions and white shoes that are scuffed and dirty. Our narrator believes his eye is "behind all [his] problems...like a slimy deep sea fish from a hidden world." Brought together by their differences and their shared victimhood, the two teens find a safe haven in the world of words they build. Rather than fight back, they actively succumb to the daily violence wreaked on them, clinging to the philosophy that giving in can be an act of resistance. "No matter what they do, we come to school each day, which makes them even more scared," Kojima reasons. On the contrary, the harm they endure becomes more severe, and cheap kicks and punches escalate into grisly attacks that border on snuff. Still, Kawakami manages to pull us further in, illuminating the perils within the social structures we've been taught to trust. An unexpected classic.

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Starred review from April 1, 2021
Kawakami's (Breasts and Eggs, 2020) powerful and unassuming novel explores horrific accounts of bullying in a Japanese school. The unnamed 14-year-old narrator gets tormented by classmates for having a lazy eye. Instead of standing up to them, he resigns himself to his fate, believing there is nothing he can do about it. A female fellow student, Kojima, notices him and starts leaving him notes in his pencil case. They become friends but never talk to each other at school. At the beginning of summer, Kojima asks the boy to come with her to Heaven: a place where those who have endured immense sadness now live in harmony. However, their trip is cut short when they both realize they cannot completely escape their realities back home. When they are cornered by their tormentors together, the boy is faced with the choice to stand up and fight or to commit an act of aggression against his only friend. Kawakami's depiction of cruelty among youths is raw and vivid. She uses her characters to explore the thought processes behind bullies and their victims and how such depraved human behaviors can exist. Her sensitive, evocative storytelling sets her apart as an incredible literary talent.

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