Out

A Novel

by

Paperback, 416 pages

English language

Published Jan. 3, 2005 by Vintage.

ISBN:
978-1-4000-7837-0
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4 stars (1 review)

Nothing in Japanese literature prepares us for the stark, tension-filled, plot-driven realism of Natsuo Kirino's award-winning literary mystery Out.

This mesmerizing novel tells the story of a brutal murder in the staid Tokyo suburbs, as a young mother who works the night shift making boxed lunches strangles her abusive husband and then seeks the help of her coworkers to dispose of the body and cover up her crime. The coolly intelligent Masako emerges as the plot's ringleader but quickly discovers that this killing is merely the beginning, as it leads to a terrifying foray into the violent underbelly of Japanese society.

At once a masterpiece of literary suspense and pitch-black comedy of gender warfare, Out is also a moving evocation of the pressures and prejudices that drive women to extreme deeds and the friendships that bolster them in the aftermath.

7 editions

reviewed Out by Natsuo Kirino

Four women getting dragged into the deadly criminal scene of Tokyo

4 stars

The author did a great job at bringing this grim atmosphere to live. We follow four women trying to get by with a bad paying job in the night shift of a factory. All of them have their respective problems but one day one of the women drastically changes that.

For anyone wanting to read an atmospheric crime story set in '90s Tokyo should pick this up. We get a look at the less favourable sides of this city and its' citizens.

Subjects

  • Thrillers
  • Japanese (Language) Contemporary Fiction
  • Fiction
  • Fiction - Mystery/ Detective
  • Mystery & Detective - General
  • Fiction / Thrillers
  • Mystery & Detective - Women Sleuths
  • Suspense
  • Detective and mystery stories
  • Japan
  • Social conditions
  • Tokyo (Japan)
  • Yakuza