Breasts and Eggs (Natsu Monogatari)

Mieko Kawakami, who exploded into the cultural space first as a musician, then as a poet & popular blogger, is perhaps best known as one of Japan's most important and best-selling literary voices. Challenging every preconception about storytelling & prose style, she is currently one of Japan's most widely read & critically acclaimed authors, heralded by Haruki Murakami as his favorite new writer.

Breasts and Eggs focuses on the female body, telling the story of three women: the thirty-year-old unmarried narrator, her older sister Makiko, & Makiko's daughter Midoriko. In the book's first part, set over three stiflingly hot days in Tokyo, Makiko, who is unable to come to terms with her changed body after giving birth, becomes obsessed with the prospect of getting breast enhancement surgery. Meanwhile, her twelve-year-old daughter Midoriko is paralyzed by the fear of puberty & finds herself unable to voice the vague, yet overwhelming pressures associated with growing up. The narrator struggles with her own indeterminable identity of being neither a "daughter" nor a "mother." In the book's second part, set on another hot summer day ten years later, the narrator, having reconciled herself with the idea of never marrying, nonetheless feels increasing anxiety about.

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In 2019, Kawakami published the two-part novel Natsu Monogatari (夏物語, lit. 'Summer Stories'). The first half of Natsu Monogatari is a completely rewritten version of the original 2008 novella Chichi to Ran (乳と卵, lit. 'Breasts and Eggs'). Chichi to Ran won the 138th Akutagawa Prize (2007). The second half is a continuation of the narrative. It is considered a sequel to the original novella, using the same characters & settings. The first half was originally published in the March 2019 issue of Bungakukai. The second half was published in the April 2019 issue of Bungakukai.