Review by Kirstin
Record of a Night Too Brief
A mind-bending treat for Kawakami completists
One for Japanese literature obsessives, the fabulously titled Record of a Night Too Brief by Hiromi Kawakami is a trio of increasingly trippy stories, centred on women undergoing transformative (to say the least) life experiences. Originally published in 1996, Kawakami’s rising stardom blessed us with an English translation in 2017. In this gem from the Pushkin Press Japanese Short Story Collection, Kawakami considers convention and tradition alongside the strangests of plots, her seemingly everyday women plunged into surreal tales involving unending night, shape-shifting, and a family whose members are prone to vanishing.