“Asa: The Girl Who Turned into a Pair of Chopsticks” by Natsuko Imamura, published by Faber & Faber in 2024, is a collection of three strange stories with a beating heart that is rooted in the human experience.
Translated from the Japanese by Lucy North, the collection dissolves the boundary between reality and fantasy, using the bizarre as a way of illuminating the inner lives of its female protagonists. When I picked it up one uneventful afternoon I wasn’t fully prepared for the wild ride it turned out to be.
Imamura begins with seemingly impossible ideas — a girl devastated by the fact that no one will eat the food she prepares, another who longs to be hit just once, and a young woman who gradually assumes the role of a family’s pet — and follows each premise with such emotional conviction that the absurd begins to feel plausible.
Across the three thought-provoking stories, the author explores womanhood, transformation, violence, alienation, and the universal desire to be seen and understood.
Childhood innocence and youthful naivety are rendered as exposed wounds, leaving her characters especially vulnerable to the cruelties of the world around them.
