Grotesque

The latest book by Natsuo Karino is more of a psychological character study than a thriller like Out, her last novel. Most, but not all of the important plot elements are revealed right away and the rest of the book relates past events that helped form their characters. The main narrator who remains unnamed is the pathologically envious, plain older sister to the uncommonly beautiful Yuriko.

We know the end of the story right at the beginning. The younger sister becomes a prostitute and is murdered. An old classmate from the prestigious Q High School for Young Women also becomes a prostitute and is murdered by the same person a year later. The reader is taken back and forth in time to discover how it all began. There are no easy clear-cut answers and many of the characters lie, not only in their various modes of confession, but also to themselves.

One thing that intrigued me right off the bat was Kirino's departure from traditional norms of storytelling. In a story where their are deaths, natural or otherwise, the character in the "last man standing" position usually is placed there for a specific purpose. Most of the time they have a lover that they are supposed to be with and/ or create a new family unit or some other archetypal reason.

This book blew those traditions away. Our last woman standing is unnamed, neither gives nor receives love, and has done nothing positive with her life. A resentful and bitter loser. This type is usually the first to go and yet she is the one who lives on. Very intriguing.

This book disturbed me for a long time because it shows people who cannot be helped. It is almost as though they were born hateful, amoral, or with a solid chip on their shoulder. The murderer, a bitter man who resents everything has quite an interesting story to tell. Not interesting in that he inspires compassion, but almost as a clinical study for for using resentment over being poor as an excuse to commit crimes.

What this book does is get inside the heads of unpleasant people and visit with their issues and intrusive thought patterns. Although it gave little hope for lasting change it made me think alot about how "grotesque" hate really is.