Overview

"A BEST BOOK OF 2020 TIME Magazine・The Atlantic・Book Riot・Electric Literature・The New York Times (Notable Book of the Year) The story of three women by a writer hailed by Haruki Murakami as Japan's most important contemporary novelist, WINNER OF THE AKUTAGAWA PRIZE. On a sweltering summer day, Makiko travels from Osaka to Tokyo, where her sister Natsu lives. She is in the company of her daughter, Midoriko, who has lately grown silent, finding herself unable to voice the vague yet overwhelming pressures associated with adolescence. The story of these three women reunited in a working-class neighborhood of Tokyo is told through the gaze of Natsu--thirty years old, an aspiring writer, haunted by hardships endured in her youth. Over the course of their few days together in the capital, Midoriko's silence will prove a catalyst for each woman to confront her fears and family secrets. On yet another blistering summer's day eight years later, Natsu, during a journey back to her native city, struggles with her own indeterminate identity as she confronts anxieties about growing old alone and childless. One of Japan's most important and best-selling writers, Mieko Kawakami mixes stylistic inventiveness, wry humor, and riveting emotional depth to tell a story of contemporary womanhood in Japan. Breasts and Eggs recounts the intimate journeys of three women on the path to finding peace and futures they can call their own. ""Original and deeply moving...This book is a gift.""--Laura van den Berg"

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9781609456702

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Reviews

A stunning work of iridescence, changing with the light. For good reason this promises to be one of the most talked-about novels of the year. --Financial Times A bracing, feminist exploration of daily life in Japan. --Entertainment Weekly Not just some elevated piece of literary chick-lit. [Breasts and Eggs is] a novel of humanity, a multifaceted consideration of the fundamental question: What does it mean to exist? [. . .] A street-smart, distinctly Osakan empathy reverberates throughout this perpetually surprising, cleverly spiraling novel. --The Japan Times Kawakami, in her first book to be published in English, considers the agency that women exert over their bodies and charts the emotional underpinnings of physical changes--both intentional and unbidden--with humor and empathy. --The New Yorker Kawakami's timely feminist themes; strange, surreal prose; and wonderful characters will transcend cultural barriers and enchant readers. --The New York Observer Kawakami's narrative is bracing and evocative, tender yet unflinching in depicting the relationship between the sisters and between mother and daughter. --Publishers Weekly Kawakami writes frankly about the mix of envy, admiration, scorn, and devotion that women feel towards each other. --Jennifer Schaffer, The Baffler The book is so much about the body. If you are craving a novel that really describes a woman's body so well, just in terms of desire, in terms of longing, in terms of a sense of self, then this is a fantastic novel to read and I highly recommend it. --Kat Chow, NPR Within an affecting portrait-of-an-artist-in-transition, Kawakami deftly, deeply questions the assumptions of womanhood and family--the bonds and abuses, expectations and betrayals, choices and denials. --Booklist Kawakami writes with unsettling precision about the body--its discomforts, its appetites, its smells and secretions. And she is especially good at capturing its longings. --Katie Kitamura, The New York Times Book Review A unique, direct voice--almost every page contains sentences that stop me in my tracks. --Marta Bausells in Literary Hub [Breasts and Eggs] speaks to the stories of Lucia Berlin; there is the same sense of a dispassionate but honoring gaze cast on working-class women, dogged and unsentimental in their survival. --Hermione Hoby, 4 Columns Fearless in its demand for accountability, transcendent in its honesty, it breathes life into feminist literature. --PopMatters This powerful story is a testament to female relationships, the role that memories play in the now, forgiveness and the ability to grow, no matter how painful it can be --Happy Mag Timeless and thoroughly contemporary, intimate and expansive, Natsuko and her companions encompass extremes in a singular and unforgettable fashion. --The Midwest Book Review Mieko Kawakami deftly captures the anxiety of performing gender, while asking tough questions about class and the expectations of women. --BuzzFeed News Kawakami's book is complex and multi-layered, asking us deep and profound questions about humanity, social rules, procreation, and femininity. --The Fountain Kawakami is known for her manipulation of language, and in Breasts and Eggs the body is just another given, with tenderness traded for candor. --Willamette Week Breasts and Eggs provides the possibility of transformation through self-acceptance and understanding. Regardless of their various ordeals, characters choose, despite everything, to live, forming relationships and families that are eccentric in structure but just as warm and welcoming. --Asymptote Journal I can never forget the sense of pure astonishment I felt when I first read Mieko Kawakami's novella Breasts and Eggs . . . Kawakami is always ceaselessly growing and evolving. --Haruki Murakami, author of The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle Mieko Kawakami is Japan's Brightest New Literary Star. --The Economist One of Japan's brightest stars is set to explode across the global skies of literature . . . Kawakami is both a writer's writer and an entertainer, a thinker and constantly evolving stylist who manages to be highly readable and immensely popular. --The Japan Times

A sharply observed and heartbreaking portrait of what it means to be a woman, in Japan and beyond. --TIME, The 10 Best Fiction Books of 2020 Fantastic. --Kat Chow, NPR Stunning. --Financial Times Kawakami writes with unsettling precision about the body...she is especially good at capturing its longings. --Katie Kitamura, The New York Times I can never forget the sense of pure astonishment I felt when I first read Mieko Kawakami's Breasts and Eggs. --Haruki Murakami A unique, direct voice--almost every page contains sentences that stop me in my tracks. --Marta Bausells, LitHub Will transcend cultural barriers and enchant readers. --Alina Cohen, New York Observer Mieko Kawakami's first full-scale novel to be translated from Japanese into English reveals what a Catherine Wheel of talent she is, how unplaceable and unique. --John Freeman, Literary Hub A striking portrait of contemporary working-class womanhood. --New Statesman Addresses the multifaceted nature of what it means to move through the world as a woman. --Ploughshares Kawakami's prose is bold, modern, and surprising. Breasts and Eggs is a moving story about womanhood and modern life told through the lens of a supremely confident writer. --An Yu, author of Braised Pork Within an affecting portrait-of-an-artist-in-transition, Kawakami deftly, deeply questions the assumptions of womanhood and family--the bonds and abuses, expectations and betrayals, choices and denials. --Terry Hong, Booklist A feminist masterwork. --Entertainment Weekly [Kawakami's] voice is intimate, musical, at times wry and powerfully observant to the inner lives of women and girls. --Kali Fajardo Anstine, ELLE Magazine Breasts and Eggs speaks to the stories of Lucia Berlin; there is the same sense of a dispassionate but honoring gaze cast on working-class women, dogged and unsentimental in their survival. --Hermione Hoby, 4 Columns

Author Information

Mieko Kawakami is the author of the internationally best-selling novel, Breasts and Eggs, a New York Times Notable Book of the Year and one of TIME's Best 10 Books of 2020. Born in Osaka, Kawakami made her literary debut as a poet in 2006, and published her first novella, My Ego, My Teeth, and the World, in 2007. Her writing is known for its poetic qualities and its insights into the female body, ethical questions, and the dilemmas of modern society. Her books have been translated into many languages and are available all over the world. She has received numerous prestigious literary awards in Japan, including the Akutagawa Prize, the Tanizaki Prize, and the Murasaki Shikibu Prize. Kawakami lives in Tokyo, Japan.

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