- Morgan R.
- Tuesday, January 04, 2022
"Some days I can't quite work out how I got here; I opted for the guy, I opted for the kids, I just didn't realize that meant waving goodbye to everything else."
Emily Itami’s 2021 literary debut Fault Lines, centers around Mizuki, a Tokyo housewife and mother of two precocious and sweet children. Mizuki seemingly has it all; the family, the clothes, the beauty, the apartment in the twinkling and bustling city, and, she never has to worry about financial constraints, but she lacks (and longs for) the freedom she once had. Her hard-working and indifferent husband, Tatsuya spends the majority of his time at the office which leaves Mizuki to often wonder things like, “Is it normal to fluctuate so quickly between feeling tender toward your husband and fervently wishing him a violent death?". She eventually bumps elbows with a handsome and charming restauranter, Kiyoshi, and the two develop an evolving relationship. Mizuki is left on the figurative fault line of the life she has and the life she desires.
“After all the years I've spent with him not seeing me, I don't see him anymore either. We exist like two blind fish, sliding past each other cordially in our parallel universes.”
This book has a seemingly simple plot, but there is more to read between the lines. We get to know Mizuki from the first page, and while her life may look completely different than mine or yours, she is immediately relatable and shares a pure and unflinchingly honest insight into motherhood, marriage, and the craving for absolute autonomy. Itami exposes social and cultural pressures, the meaning of motherhood, and the life-altering decisions we make. If you have one of those car decals that says, “I used to be cool”, this one’s for you. Written with wit, humor, and relatable one-liners, Itami is an author to watch.
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“My children. My life’s work, my greatest loves, orchestrators of total psychological trauma and everyday destruction.”
What the critics are saying:
"What’s intriguing about Fault Lines is its shrewd commentary on Japan’s societal expectations of women as either sex objects or dutiful mothers. As Mizuki eventually learns, it’s in striking a workable balance between these two dichotomies — her past life versus her present one, titillating desire versus familial obligations, who she wants to be versus who society dictates she should be — that the real work of living begins.” -- Washington Post
"This remarkably strong debut has volumes to say about choices, adulthood, tradition and freedom." -- Ms. Magazine
"What is the cost of a mother’s desire?...Emily Itami explores this question with wit and poignancy." -- New York Times Book Review
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