People From My Neighbourhood by Hiromi Kawakami

On discovering ‘emotion shacks’ at the edge of town, the narrator and her friend learn the shacks absorb and expand when someone with the corresponding emotion enters them. A group of the little kids had buried a woman’s corpse at the bottom of the school grounds.”Īll the stories contain a magical element that helps to build them in grand ways, extending the narrative far beyond their brevity.

“The end of the buriers came when someone revealed that they had buried raw stuff. A group called the Buriers are called upon to bury random items the town no longer needs until they are discovered burying a body: Everyone is struck down by Pigeonitis, a condition that makes their eyes grow wide and their chests bulge as they strut around mindlessly. Random outbreaks and bizarre happenings plague the neighborhood where they all live. Some characters move across genders, and others live out their entire life story across the matter of two or three pages. The Dog School Principal, who keeps a watchful eye over the local dog park, is similarly only referred to by his role. Kanae is our narrator’s best friend, but her sister is only ever referred to as Kanae’s sister, despite appearing in several stories. Many of the characters don’t have names and are instead referred to through aliases. With escalating oddity, we learn all about the quirks and unusual pastimes of the weird and weirder growing cast of characters. Through a series of interlocked vignettes, Kawakami takes us on a journey that spans the lifetime of our main narrator, as they recall a series of stories about their neighbourhood and the people that have lived there. The distinguishing feature of this newest release is the entire story is written in flash fiction form. This review is available to non-members for a limited time.Readers of Hiromi Kawakami’s novels will be ready to expect the hint of magical realism interlaced with human relationships that her most recent book, People From My Neighbourhood (2020), offers. The driver remarks at the local tavern that he has been out 'driving with the girls.' 'omen are women,' he explains, 'They're still fun to have around, even if they look sort of blurry and don't have legs.' Needless to say, this book is very funny. In 'The Tenement,' a taxi driver lives in a tenement building that is haunted by the ghosts of the women who once lived there. Her language, translated with grace by Ted Goossen, is imminently quotable. Many of the stories are bizarre, but they are neither too cute nor weird for the sake of being weird. Kawakami skirts the line between realism and the fantastical with precision. 'There's a hell, the old man said, for people who are mean to chickens.' Of course there is, tell me more. Stories often begin abruptly, as though you were in the middle of a conversation with the narrator and briefly spaced out - you feel you have to accept whatever is being said to catch up.

People From My Neighbourhood by Hiromi Kawakami