Out by Natsuo Kirino Summary and Reviews
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Book Reviews of Out
Book Review: Good book, but is this a Mystery Novel ?
Summary: 3 Stars
No need for me to give the short summary of the book again, others have done a great job doing that for me. I've enjoyed the book, that puts the reader into the lives of very believable characters in modern day Japan. It's well written, probably part due a very good translator. But I should make a note about the category the book is put into: a mystery novel. I can not understand this fits into this category. There's nothing of a mystery in this book. Everything is either obviously predictable, or just plain written before it happens. Nowhere in its 360 pages have I ever wondered "Mmmmm, what would happen next" or "who would be that misterious man". No, don't expect any suspense, thriller, or mistery. Just a plain, though bloody at some times, story. If you set that expectation, you'll have a lot of satisfaction reading it.Book Review: Grisly and difficult to put down.
Summary: 5 Stars
This is an intense book about a group of late shift female co-workers at a boxed lunch factory. It is extremely effective in portraying the desperation in their day to lives and effectively shows how even the most gruesome of deeds can become just another yucky job if the pay is good enough. It's so violent that, at times, it's almost funny yet also very sad and frighteningly realistic as well. This was one of those impossible to put down books but isn't for the faint of heart as it gets quite grisly.
Book Review: Gruesome and Gripping!
Summary: 5 Stars
When I learned that this author, Kirno had won Japan's mystery reward, I felt compelled to read it. First, it was very well-written, well-structured and most of all, the translation was excellent! To translate well is critical, but the correct message and exact feelings told must be conveyed to the reader exactly as the foreign author intended.
I became engrossed in this suspenseful plot that begins with a strangulation, grisly butchering, packing and disposal of a one's husband. The plot involves changing personalities within the characters and there are those we have sympathy for and those we truly learn to despise. We follow them throughout and we have hope and fear for them.
The backdrop is the underbelly of Japan and the story evolves out of a depressed working and home environment, where gloom prevails, and despair sets in. We enter the story as four women who endure rigid labor at a box-lunch factory. A sharp contrasts exists between the dirty gritty environment and the strict rules and regulations for proper hygiene at the box-factory. Aside from the mechanics of the box-lunch factory, you will enter into the world of illegal gambling and loan sharks.
Lucy-san and Ethel-san Gone Real Bad!
When one woman, Yoyoi, strangles her husband with a belt, and her co-worker-friends Masako and Yoshie dismember the body, I couldn't help speculate that when the grisly task is assigned to the small home bathroom in daylight, something is bound to get screwed up. If anything will go wrong, it will! Then, with the uninvited advance of a third co-worker, the slip-ups unfold and suspense builds.
A Gruesome Twist
With many suspense stories, you can anticipate twists, but the surprise was a chilling revelation.
And not to spoil the ending, it wasn't as much a surprise that what was to happen. It was merely the IDEA that something else.....more gruesome than one can imagine....had to happen.
Movie in the works
Yes, I understand in 2005, a movie will be OUT. Let's just hope it's an authentic Japanese movie complete with subtitles. Nothing more, because this story deserves a great production, and the Japanese can do it. ....Overall, this was an excellent read!....MzRizz
Book Review: Having lived in Japan
Summary: 5 Stars
this opens up so many vistas I failed to observe during my time there. Truly a "Thelma & Louise" story of the brutality of men towards women in Japanese society, the book says even more about the day to day struggles of the "every" Japanese.Book Review: Indescribably nerve-wracking!
Summary: 5 Stars
Words cannot describe how well this book captures the reader's attention with the stark reality it presents. It's certainly not a flowery "happy ending" story; it's a story of a real woman living a real life, and it certainly shows the reader that real life is never black and white. Kirino-san masterfully paints each image as she shows how one life connects with another, how it all starts with something as simple and complicated as a burst of passing anger.
This being my first heavy adult novel, it's a completely different outlook into the Japanese world, a world I've only been acquainted with through a child's eyes. Certainly, the extent to which a human soul's darkness can go is limitless. Kirino-san exposes this fact marvelously with the excellent characterization. The reader would never even think that the characters are mere fiction, despite the seemingly outlandish things they think of and do.
Definitely not for the faint of heart, this novel paints the darker, more elusive face of the world and of humanity. It most certainly is a page-turner that, once it catches your attention, will never let go.