As with Hotel Iris, Ogawa highlights three quiet girls. In the title (and first) story, a high school girl obsessed with her foster brother watches him during his diving practices while looking for ways to release the frustration she feels at being the only child of parents who own an orphanage. In the second story, Pregnancy Diary, a young woman writes about her older sister's pregnancy in a diary. The final story, Dormitory, follows the story of a woman who returns to the dormitory she stayed in throughout college and befriends the manager.
Ogawa is an interesting writer because she introduces these shy, quiet characters and begins to spin a story that is somewhat disturbing. She provides her readers with great character studies. Following along with Hotel Iris, the writing itself is absolutely beautiful. Particularly in the first (and most disturbing) story, there were some gorgeous quotes. I haven't copied them down yet so I don't have any to share with you today, but maybe soon.
(Book cover taken from bn.com.)
It's a pity you don;t yet have the quotes as I would have loved to read some. Based on your words, she does sound like an interesting writer. I like me a disturbing story too lol
ReplyDeleteP.S. Thank you a lot for stopping by my blog and such kind feedback! Living in West Africa sounds like an amazing experience to me!