The Broken Bridge: Fiction from Expatriates in Literary Japan

by Suzanne Kamata (Editor), Donald Richie (Introduction)

Absorbing fiction from Outsiders in a land that does not absorb foreigners easily.

Genres: Japan, Fiction, Short Stories

360 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1997

About the author

Five-time Pushcart Prize nominee Suzanne Kamata is the author of the memoir Squeaky Wheels: Travels with My Daughter by Train, Plane, Metro, Tuk-tuk and Wheelchair (Wyatt-Mackenzie, 2019); the novels Indigo Girl (GemmaMedia, 2019), The Mermaids of Lake Michigan (Wyatt-Mackenzie, 2017), Screaming Divas (Merit Press, 2014), Gadget Girl: The Art of Being Invisible (GemmaMedia, 2013) and Losing Kei (Leapfrog Press, 2008); and editor of three anthologies - The Broken Bridge: Fiction from Expatriates in Literary Japan, Love You to Pieces: Creative Writers on Raising a Child with Special Needs, and Call Me Okaasan: Adventures in Multicultural Mothering (Wyatt-Mackenzie Publishing, 2009). Her short fiction and essays have appeared widely. She was a winner in the memoir category of the Half the World Global Literati Award.

Reviews

[Books on Asia · Rating 4 out of 5]

I enjoyed reading pieces by well-known writers from back in the day such as David Lazarus, Edward Seidensticker and Donald Richie. Some of the authors are still writing, including Alex Kerr, Holly Thompson and Leza Lowitz. This anthology does suffer from what many such collections do: the repetition of similar themes and first-person stories, many thinly veiled as fiction. It is explained quite well in the introduction why this dominant theme of the foreigner in Japan is so pervasive, and even unique to Japan, but still, it's a shame more writers didn't opt for the third-person POV or a completely different format to explore this theme the way Seidensticker and Richie at least did. Creativity would have made for a more interesting and varied read.

[Christopher Green · Rating 5 out of 5]

There was much to enjoy in this collection of thirty-six short stories and, being an expatriate in Japan, a lot of thought provoking material. My favorite story in the first read through is The Podiatrist by Daniel Rosenblum, so tightly written and engrossing from start to finish. However, if I borrow the book from the library again I may well find I have a new favorite on second reading. Donald Richie’s Introduction also concisely and entertainingly describes the phases of expatriate life in Japan. It’s also so, oh, convenient to have these stories by expatriates in Japan in one place rather than to have to go looking for them here and there.

[Crystal · Rating 4 out of 5]

I really appreciated the variety of this anthology. The writers were famous and hitherto unknown to me, male and female, immediate post-war to my contemporaries. Their characters were also diverse: men and women, Japanese, American, French, Australian, German, young and old, in international marriages, marriages to their own countrymen, single, divorced. There were English teachers and members of the armed forces, but also business people, a potter, and a podiatrist. Some stories emphasized aspects of traditional Japanese culture, some took its bleak modernity as backdrop. Despite the common theme of Japan, the stories reminded me that foreigners here are just as diverse as people at home. As one would expect, with so many stories some moved me much more than others, but that too was part of the variety.

[Nikki Warren]

Some stories were good; others not so.