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Bird Life
The second novel by Booker Prize–longlisted author Anna Smaill. A lyrical and ambitious exploration of madness and what it is like to experience the world differently.In Ueno Park, Tokyo, as workers and tourists gather for lunch, the pollen blows, a fountain erupts, pigeons scatter, and two women meet, changing the course of one another’s lives. Dinah has come to Japan from New Zealand to teach English and grieve the death of her brother, Michael, a troubled genius who was able to channel his problems into music as a classical pianist — until he wasn’t. In the seemingly empty, eerie apartment block where Dinah has been housed, she sees Michael everywhere, even as she feels his absence sharply. Yasuko is polished, precise, and keenly observant — of her students and colleagues at the language school, and of the natural world. When she was thirteen, animals began to speak to her, to tell her things she did not always want to hear. She has suppressed these powers for many years, but sometimes she allows them to resurface, to the dismay of her adult son, Jun. One day, she returns home, and Jun has gone. Even her special gifts cannot bring him back. As these two women deal with their individual traumas, they form an unlikely friendship in which each will help the other to see a different possible world, as Smaill teases out the tension between our internal and external lives and asks what we lose by having to choose between them.
293 pages, Hardcover
First published January 2, 2024
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1036 people want to read
About the author
Anna Smaill
7 books105 followersAnna Smaill lives in Wellington with her husband, novelist Carl Shuker, and her daughter. She studied performance violin at Canterbury University and creative writing at the International Institute of Modern Letters at the University of Victoria, and has a PhD in English Literature from University College London. She is the author of one book of poetry (The Violinist in Spring, VUP 2005) and her poems have been published and anthologised in New Zealand and the United Kingdom. Her first novel The Chimes will be published by Sceptre in Feburary 2015.
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February 2, 2024I’m lucky enough to work with Anna, and this is something I felt compelled to send her yesterday —
Congratulations on your longlisting for the Ockhams. I was reflecting on this last night while reading your book. There are some absolute barnstormers on the list – Emily, Eleanor, Catherine. I was thinking about how gung-ho they all are – so pacey, and with some quite broad characterisation (in the case of Birnam Wood that feels satirical of course; Pet carries its recent-past research really lightly and with Lioness, it’s the cringey moments that bring the book into high definition for me). Bird Life is more like a watercolour – not in the sense of being delicate at all, but that it feels like there’s no room for mistakes. Every word, very evocation feels so carefully weighed and placed: like those stories you read about beautiful mosaics, where the tiny stones are laid just right, so as best to reflect the light.
Congratulations on your longlisting for the Ockhams. I was reflecting on this last night while reading your book. There are some absolute barnstormers on the list – Emily, Eleanor, Catherine. I was thinking about how gung-ho they all are – so pacey, and with some quite broad characterisation (in the case of Birnam Wood that feels satirical of course; Pet carries its recent-past research really lightly and with Lioness, it’s the cringey moments that bring the book into high definition for me). Bird Life is more like a watercolour – not in the sense of being delicate at all, but that it feels like there’s no room for mistakes. Every word, very evocation feels so carefully weighed and placed: like those stories you read about beautiful mosaics, where the tiny stones are laid just right, so as best to reflect the light.
January 20, 2024
Bird Life by Anna Smaill has hit me a little differently than any novel I’ve read in quite a while. At first, this novel appears to be about the unexpected friendship between a young teacher from New Zealand and an older native speaker in Japan, both joined through tragedy and magical powers.
It is easy (and a little too quickly) to criticize this novel as it seems to not have anything that moves it along or that creates memorable and relatable characters. However, Smaill has presented a true dichotomization of what is reality and what is reality for someone with mental health issues. By the final of three parts, the reader understands what it feels like to struggle with reality within mental sickness because readers are not 100% confident in what is or isn’t happening.
“She was standing in this position when she heard it. Nothing remarkable at all, really. A quiet hum. Gentle, like a cat purring. But she recognised it. It was a gentle chastisement. And she understood that it had been there all along. She had pushed her panic into it. The thousand things: fear, desire, panic. She had drowned it out. Relief came to Yasuko. But not like before, not all at once. It came quietly, steadily. There was no sense of desperation or fear. There was no grand delight nor rush of blood. It was something simple and steady. She turned and looked up at the sky with a stronger sense of gravity altogether.
Her gift was not an ignis fatuus. It would not go away and leave her. It was in her and indivisible from her being, as she was part of the day, part of the sky itself.
The hum came from the sky. Her powers speaking. And a darkening, as if before a storm.
She stood and watched. The hum transformed. It became a flapping, a great and wild disturbance of the city’s frequencies.
Then there were birds. Wings in the sky. She saw them: pigeons, crows, sparrows, magpies, thrushes, shrikes. City birds and those from parks and further afield. Wings up like sails. She felt her heart move in her chest, with gratitude. They came in waves and landed on the concrete, layers of them, a black and grey and moving carpet. In the pet shop down the concrete path, she could hear the tame pets shrieking. They were pacing, pressing against the glass. The lap dogs barking, the kittens scratching, the rabbits slamming at the boards with their paws as if they could dig themselves free. She stood in the middle of the concrete, and the birds of the air came to her.
Some perched on her body, some on her hair. Their claws grasped tight as if to say: you will never be alone. We are your children too.”
(“Bird Life” by Smaill,Anna)
This novel is less about Dinah befriending and helping Yasuko (and being helped by Yasuko).
“Each of us has a small flame, a light that is our very own. Wouldn’t you agree?…
“In my experience, people are either vampires or cattle. The vampires try to drain your light, your warmth; they get a sort of strength from it. The others, the cattle, they are simply ignorant, they trample blindly everywhere. I am not sure which is worse….
Wherever I am I can tell the exact moment someone else begins to press upon my flame, when they try to borrow from or bend that little filament. I am almost pathological in my protection of this small flame.”
(“Bird Life” by Smaill,Anna)
It is more about Dinah and Jun connecting over their loss of the most important people in their lives to mental illness. Both have to find their identities and begin from noting, after their identities being entirely defined by those they’ve lost.
“Everything was floating, floating in the light, and Dinah understood at last that everything had been there all along. It was she who had been blind. She had not seen any of it. On and on they walked, going deeper or further in toward the heart of something, though who knew what that might be.”
(“Bird Life” by Smaill,Anna)
Smaill’s writing took my breath away at times, especially in the final part of the book.
“Tell me about your brother,’ Jun said.
‘We were twins,’ said Dinah. ‘He built the world, and we both lived inside it. He made it up, and I believed him.’…
“Jun shrugged. ‘I don’t know if surviving is what I am doing. But what I am doing, what I am forcing myself to do, is trying to see the world without her in it. It is very, very dull. There are no short cuts. I don’t know how to make anything come alive. But I have to do it”
(“Bird Life” by Smaill,Anna)
I was provided a free DRC of this book by Edelweiss in exchange for my honest opinion.
It is easy (and a little too quickly) to criticize this novel as it seems to not have anything that moves it along or that creates memorable and relatable characters. However, Smaill has presented a true dichotomization of what is reality and what is reality for someone with mental health issues. By the final of three parts, the reader understands what it feels like to struggle with reality within mental sickness because readers are not 100% confident in what is or isn’t happening.
“She was standing in this position when she heard it. Nothing remarkable at all, really. A quiet hum. Gentle, like a cat purring. But she recognised it. It was a gentle chastisement. And she understood that it had been there all along. She had pushed her panic into it. The thousand things: fear, desire, panic. She had drowned it out. Relief came to Yasuko. But not like before, not all at once. It came quietly, steadily. There was no sense of desperation or fear. There was no grand delight nor rush of blood. It was something simple and steady. She turned and looked up at the sky with a stronger sense of gravity altogether.
Her gift was not an ignis fatuus. It would not go away and leave her. It was in her and indivisible from her being, as she was part of the day, part of the sky itself.
The hum came from the sky. Her powers speaking. And a darkening, as if before a storm.
She stood and watched. The hum transformed. It became a flapping, a great and wild disturbance of the city’s frequencies.
Then there were birds. Wings in the sky. She saw them: pigeons, crows, sparrows, magpies, thrushes, shrikes. City birds and those from parks and further afield. Wings up like sails. She felt her heart move in her chest, with gratitude. They came in waves and landed on the concrete, layers of them, a black and grey and moving carpet. In the pet shop down the concrete path, she could hear the tame pets shrieking. They were pacing, pressing against the glass. The lap dogs barking, the kittens scratching, the rabbits slamming at the boards with their paws as if they could dig themselves free. She stood in the middle of the concrete, and the birds of the air came to her.
Some perched on her body, some on her hair. Their claws grasped tight as if to say: you will never be alone. We are your children too.”
(“Bird Life” by Smaill,Anna)
This novel is less about Dinah befriending and helping Yasuko (and being helped by Yasuko).
“Each of us has a small flame, a light that is our very own. Wouldn’t you agree?…
“In my experience, people are either vampires or cattle. The vampires try to drain your light, your warmth; they get a sort of strength from it. The others, the cattle, they are simply ignorant, they trample blindly everywhere. I am not sure which is worse….
Wherever I am I can tell the exact moment someone else begins to press upon my flame, when they try to borrow from or bend that little filament. I am almost pathological in my protection of this small flame.”
(“Bird Life” by Smaill,Anna)
It is more about Dinah and Jun connecting over their loss of the most important people in their lives to mental illness. Both have to find their identities and begin from noting, after their identities being entirely defined by those they’ve lost.
“Everything was floating, floating in the light, and Dinah understood at last that everything had been there all along. It was she who had been blind. She had not seen any of it. On and on they walked, going deeper or further in toward the heart of something, though who knew what that might be.”
(“Bird Life” by Smaill,Anna)
Smaill’s writing took my breath away at times, especially in the final part of the book.
“Tell me about your brother,’ Jun said.
‘We were twins,’ said Dinah. ‘He built the world, and we both lived inside it. He made it up, and I believed him.’…
“Jun shrugged. ‘I don’t know if surviving is what I am doing. But what I am doing, what I am forcing myself to do, is trying to see the world without her in it. It is very, very dull. There are no short cuts. I don’t know how to make anything come alive. But I have to do it”
(“Bird Life” by Smaill,Anna)
I was provided a free DRC of this book by Edelweiss in exchange for my honest opinion.
July 9, 2023
Bird Life is a stunning read. Disorienting and dreamlike in quality, it invites us into the minds of two women: Dinah, who has travelled from New Zealand to teach English in Japan, and the enigmatic Yasuko.
Both women are grappling with loss, grief, and the weight of internal and external expectations. This creates a kind of quiet madness for both, which the reader experiences from the perspectives of both women, and their interactions with the world and people around them.
Smaill's masterful prose paints vivid portraits of Japan and Tokyo, effortlessly immersing the reader in its essence and culture. Yet, it is the intricate exploration of Dinah and Yasuko that captivated me the most. Their journeys are deftly woven into the fabric of the narrative, and the book emanates an otherworldly quality reminiscent of Murakami.
Although I wished for a deeper exploration of Yasuko's ‘powers’, I totally understand the author's deliberate choice to remain vague. It is through our immersion in the illogical realms inhabited by Dinah and Yasuko that we, as readers, truly comprehend and empathise with their very different experiences of the world around them and their emotions.
Bird Life offers a very poignant exploration mental health struggles and the impact it inflicts upon those we love, as well as the profound internal experience it presents. Anna Smaill fearlessly delves into the depths of the human condition, painting a painful, yet beautiful, portrait of love, loss, and the resilience of the human spirit.
This is unquestionably a novel for fans of literary fiction, a tapestry woven with poetic prowess and power. But, it doesn’t seek to provide us with all, or any, of the answers nor does it try to neatly resolve the problems faced by Dinah and Yasuko. Instead, it presents a snapshot of an important moment in their lives, inviting us to reflect on how the world and our relationships can affect both our experiences and those around us.
Both women are grappling with loss, grief, and the weight of internal and external expectations. This creates a kind of quiet madness for both, which the reader experiences from the perspectives of both women, and their interactions with the world and people around them.
Smaill's masterful prose paints vivid portraits of Japan and Tokyo, effortlessly immersing the reader in its essence and culture. Yet, it is the intricate exploration of Dinah and Yasuko that captivated me the most. Their journeys are deftly woven into the fabric of the narrative, and the book emanates an otherworldly quality reminiscent of Murakami.
Although I wished for a deeper exploration of Yasuko's ‘powers’, I totally understand the author's deliberate choice to remain vague. It is through our immersion in the illogical realms inhabited by Dinah and Yasuko that we, as readers, truly comprehend and empathise with their very different experiences of the world around them and their emotions.
Bird Life offers a very poignant exploration mental health struggles and the impact it inflicts upon those we love, as well as the profound internal experience it presents. Anna Smaill fearlessly delves into the depths of the human condition, painting a painful, yet beautiful, portrait of love, loss, and the resilience of the human spirit.
This is unquestionably a novel for fans of literary fiction, a tapestry woven with poetic prowess and power. But, it doesn’t seek to provide us with all, or any, of the answers nor does it try to neatly resolve the problems faced by Dinah and Yasuko. Instead, it presents a snapshot of an important moment in their lives, inviting us to reflect on how the world and our relationships can affect both our experiences and those around us.
January 21, 2024
Bird Life by Anna Smaill is a book written by a New Zealand author masquerading as a translated Japanese novel. It is set in Tokyo and conveys the Japanese location and society so well you can be forgiven for believing this was written by a Japanese author. Instead Smaill draws on her experiences of living in Japan to craft a strangely compelling yet mildly confusing book. It is a meditation on grief and mental illness but told in a very different way to anything you may have read before.
In the book two women meet and change the course of one another’s lives. Dinah has arrived from New Zealand to teach English while Yasuko is a local teacher at the language school. Dinah is running from the death of her twin brother Michael and drowning in her grief. Yasuko is a calm and poised person but she also has a strange power. When she was thirteen animals started to talk to her and while she is mostly able to suppress her “powers” they sometimes reappear which upsets her adult son Jun. He eventually leaves home without telling Yasuko where is now lives.
As Dinah and Yasuko individually try to deal with their grief an animal tells Yasuko that they have brought her a girl to help. She approaches Dinah in a park and an unlikely friendship begins. From here I was swept up in the oddness of the pair’s relationship. Dinah begins to see her dead brother Michael in her apartment and Yasuko has plans for Dinah and Jun to meet. The blending of grief and clear mental health concerns was disorienting.
While the writing was wonderful and the storyline unique I found that by the end I was struggling to hold onto the threads of what the book was trying to say. I don’t think this was helped by my stop start reading of it though. With this in mind I would say that I enjoyed Bird Life but didn’t fully understand it. I'd still recommend it if you like Japanese style fiction or books which really go deep into grief.
Thanks to @scribepub for my #gifted copy.
In the book two women meet and change the course of one another’s lives. Dinah has arrived from New Zealand to teach English while Yasuko is a local teacher at the language school. Dinah is running from the death of her twin brother Michael and drowning in her grief. Yasuko is a calm and poised person but she also has a strange power. When she was thirteen animals started to talk to her and while she is mostly able to suppress her “powers” they sometimes reappear which upsets her adult son Jun. He eventually leaves home without telling Yasuko where is now lives.
As Dinah and Yasuko individually try to deal with their grief an animal tells Yasuko that they have brought her a girl to help. She approaches Dinah in a park and an unlikely friendship begins. From here I was swept up in the oddness of the pair’s relationship. Dinah begins to see her dead brother Michael in her apartment and Yasuko has plans for Dinah and Jun to meet. The blending of grief and clear mental health concerns was disorienting.
While the writing was wonderful and the storyline unique I found that by the end I was struggling to hold onto the threads of what the book was trying to say. I don’t think this was helped by my stop start reading of it though. With this in mind I would say that I enjoyed Bird Life but didn’t fully understand it. I'd still recommend it if you like Japanese style fiction or books which really go deep into grief.
Thanks to @scribepub for my #gifted copy.
April 22, 2024
IIM(L)
bloated, tedious, overstuffed prose with entire paragraphs full of single actions where every sentence starts with 'she' like blocking in a script. she sits down. she opens the book. she looks out the window. she feels sad. characters use or don't use contractions seemingly at random with zero consistency which i found odd? the tone is totally whack. much of the book feels hesitant, weak, and aimless and then the word 'fuck' is thrown in or someone 'pisses' or literally right on the last page the two most milquetoast characters in the book have kinky exhibitionist sex against a tree. it feels as jarring and gross as a close-up shot of someone's asshole in the back of a dishwasher user manual.
the plot had nothing going on whatsoever and didn't say anything new or particularly interesting about grief. if the story had to exist it should have been excised down to a 5 page short story. dinah is pathetic, yasuko is underdeveloped and so crazy! love her! for little reason and thrown away by the end anyway
this was a gift so i was happy to read it but do not recommend 2/10 for the oamaru mention (i stole an essie nail polish from farmers oamaru when i was 16 therefore it's a sylvie world heritage site)
also unrealistic (the wasian character has sex)
bloated, tedious, overstuffed prose with entire paragraphs full of single actions where every sentence starts with 'she' like blocking in a script. she sits down. she opens the book. she looks out the window. she feels sad. characters use or don't use contractions seemingly at random with zero consistency which i found odd? the tone is totally whack. much of the book feels hesitant, weak, and aimless and then the word 'fuck' is thrown in or someone 'pisses' or literally right on the last page the two most milquetoast characters in the book have kinky exhibitionist sex against a tree. it feels as jarring and gross as a close-up shot of someone's asshole in the back of a dishwasher user manual.
the plot had nothing going on whatsoever and didn't say anything new or particularly interesting about grief. if the story had to exist it should have been excised down to a 5 page short story. dinah is pathetic, yasuko is underdeveloped and so crazy! love her! for little reason and thrown away by the end anyway
this was a gift so i was happy to read it but do not recommend 2/10 for the oamaru mention (i stole an essie nail polish from farmers oamaru when i was 16 therefore it's a sylvie world heritage site)
also unrealistic (the wasian character has sex)
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February 29, 2024Dnf'd around 100 pages but the amount I had to struggle through I deserve a finished book towards my reading goal
October 2, 2024
I enjoyed this book, but I'd probably only recommend it to a limited audience, namely, anyone who enjoys slice of life books set in Japan. The book makes it easy to picture the setting (immaculate streets! rigid social norms! hole-in-the-wall negitoro-don shops!).
The story follows Dinah, who has moved to Japan to teach English. She feels adrift in Tokyo until she becomes friends with Yasuko. The two of them seem to be on the same wavelength. They enjoy visiting Yasuko's favourite spots around town and gossiping about some of the people they see. Yasuko's adult son Jun recently moved out of the family home and is barely responding to her messages. Yasuko entreats Dinah to connect with Jun on Yasuko's behalf. Yasuko longs for the return of powers from her younger years, which included speaking to animals and a cosmic sense of 'knowing' things. The true nature of these powers comes to light over the course of the book.
The story follows Dinah, who has moved to Japan to teach English. She feels adrift in Tokyo until she becomes friends with Yasuko. The two of them seem to be on the same wavelength. They enjoy visiting Yasuko's favourite spots around town and gossiping about some of the people they see. Yasuko's adult son Jun recently moved out of the family home and is barely responding to her messages. Yasuko entreats Dinah to connect with Jun on Yasuko's behalf. Yasuko longs for the return of powers from her younger years, which included speaking to animals and a cosmic sense of 'knowing' things. The true nature of these powers comes to light over the course of the book.
May 19, 2024
Does a lot right and has good moments but is really just an awkward pastiche of Japanese magical-realist books that have come to be so in vogue. You try to forgive this but it does not stop reminding you of the fact.
Feels weirdly unethical. Decent read though
Feels weirdly unethical. Decent read though
May 12, 2024
Anna Smail does it again with world creating. In The Chimes she created a mindbending future outer world. In Bird Life she dives into the inner worlds of three characters experiencing mental illness, and the response of those close to them. From the emptiness of grief to the extremes of mania. It left me pondering upon the blurred line between what is real and imagined.
February 16, 2024
The current Goodreads rating is 3.67, which feels about right to me. The author has an interesting way of expressing things, and a vast vocab, which I appreciated. But, overall the story was just ok and I think it will be quite immemorable.
May 25, 2024
I haven't read anything quite like this before. Metaphorical, ambiguous, some good writing but I couldn't connect with it.
June 3, 2024
3 1/2 stars. I loved the descriptions of Japan and the beautiful writing style.
I did give it dragged a little towards the end.
A book about grief, loss and running away.
I did give it dragged a little towards the end.
A book about grief, loss and running away.
June 9, 2024
Beginning was slow and the ending was confusing to me, but the writing was enjoyable. Lots of description
May 4, 2024
3.5 🤷♀️🤷♀️🤷♀️ really fun writing style, such great characters and enjoyable execution.
Ending threw me off asf. It feels to me like a weak resolution, but maybe the nuance or contradictions of it are appropriate when you’re navigating a similar situation.
I think this book is just not for me. The more you read it the more you understand the target audience no spoilers.
Ending threw me off asf. It feels to me like a weak resolution, but maybe the nuance or contradictions of it are appropriate when you’re navigating a similar situation.
I think this book is just not for me. The more you read it the more you understand the target audience no spoilers.
July 12, 2023
Thank you to NetGalley and Scribe for an ARC. This was an absolutely beautiful and haunting novel by Anna Smaill, author of The Chimes. Set in Tokyo, the book follows the gradually intertwining stories of Dinah, a New Zealander who has come to Japan to teach English, and Yasuko, a sophisticated older teacher at the same language school. Both women are dealing with loss and betrayal and the narrative gradually explores their backstories whilst interweaving elements of (possibly) magical realism or (possibly) mental illness. This was an exquisitely crafted novel which is still staying with me days after I have finished it. Highly recommended.
January 12, 2024
This book was very surreal, it mixed the mundane with grief, and the potentially "supernatural". At times I couldn't fully grasp what was happening, especially towards the end, but that was likely Smaill's intention. The boundaries of reality and fiction were very blurred, maybe to portray how things can be perceived through the lens of mental illness. An interesting and thought-provoking read that has left me reeling a little bit.
March 25, 2024
gorgeous writing through and through, this is a rare find that I want to reread and find more depth each time. one of the best books I’ve ever read
April 22, 2024
When I read The Chimes by Anna Smaill in 2017, it was a 5-star read for me, and while the details of the plot didn't stick with me, I remembered loving Smaill's writing. So when I saw Bird Life at the library I immediately grabbed it. The magical realism of this one didn't work for me as well as the straight-up fantasy of The Chimes, but I'm still glad to have read it. The author bio at the back of the edition I read says that Smaill lived in Tokyo for two years, and yeah, I am not surprised. One of the things I loved about Bird Life is the sense of Tokyo and its environs that comes through in the descriptions of parks and roads and landscapes: the convenience stores, the department stores, the apartment blocks, the landscape as seen from a commuter train (not far from the city, one character looks out at "a proper countryside of ancient mallow trees and kudzu and small shrines hidden in wild grasses as high as your hip").
The novel follows Yasuko and Dinah, who both teach English at the Saitama campus of Tokyo Denki University and who become friends when their paths cross. When the book opens, Yasuko lives with her son, Jun, who's about to turn 21; he moves out unexpectedly and won't explain why. Dinah is a New Zealander who's living abroad; we learn that her twin brother, Michael, was a talented pianist who took his own life. So Yasuko and Dinah are both dealing with loss, in different ways; their lives have also both been touched by what the book blurb calls "madness" (Michael's, for Dinah, and her own, for Yasuko: we learn that when she was in her early teens, she started hearing animals talk to her and could read other people's thoughts; ever since she has been aware of her "powers" as both a gift and a threat). We see Jun's perspective, too, near the end of the book, and how it feels to him to have been raised by a single parent who wasn't always able to be fully present during his childhood.
"Why does it have to be all one thing or another?" - this is a question Dinah asks Jun, when she's talking to him about why he has moved out, why he doesn't want to see his mother. But the question also resonates with other aspects of the plot: is madness a burden or does it come with gifts? are unexplained or unexplainable things actually happening, or not? Are we meant to read Yasuko's experiences/interpretations of certain events as delusions or coincidences, or is there something else going on? The way the book leaves aspects of these questions unresolved left me a little unsatisfied, even as I could see how it worked, thematically. But I like phrases like "anger in a woman's shape," or passages like: "He sat back in his chair to regard her. He did it slowly, as if time was something from which he had graduated, as she had." I do like the book's structure, too—especially the way we see a scene in part at the beginning of the book and then in full later on.
The novel follows Yasuko and Dinah, who both teach English at the Saitama campus of Tokyo Denki University and who become friends when their paths cross. When the book opens, Yasuko lives with her son, Jun, who's about to turn 21; he moves out unexpectedly and won't explain why. Dinah is a New Zealander who's living abroad; we learn that her twin brother, Michael, was a talented pianist who took his own life. So Yasuko and Dinah are both dealing with loss, in different ways; their lives have also both been touched by what the book blurb calls "madness" (Michael's, for Dinah, and her own, for Yasuko: we learn that when she was in her early teens, she started hearing animals talk to her and could read other people's thoughts; ever since she has been aware of her "powers" as both a gift and a threat). We see Jun's perspective, too, near the end of the book, and how it feels to him to have been raised by a single parent who wasn't always able to be fully present during his childhood.
"Why does it have to be all one thing or another?" - this is a question Dinah asks Jun, when she's talking to him about why he has moved out, why he doesn't want to see his mother. But the question also resonates with other aspects of the plot: is madness a burden or does it come with gifts? are unexplained or unexplainable things actually happening, or not? Are we meant to read Yasuko's experiences/interpretations of certain events as delusions or coincidences, or is there something else going on? The way the book leaves aspects of these questions unresolved left me a little unsatisfied, even as I could see how it worked, thematically. But I like phrases like "anger in a woman's shape," or passages like: "He sat back in his chair to regard her. He did it slowly, as if time was something from which he had graduated, as she had." I do like the book's structure, too—especially the way we see a scene in part at the beginning of the book and then in full later on.
January 8, 2024
Dinah’s twin brother, Michael, was a musical prodigy. She still sees him, even though she moved across the world after he died.
I was keen to explore the lives of these two women impacted by mental illness. Given the blurb and some early reviews, I was expecting magical realism and lines blurring reality and inner lives in turmoil.
I couldn’t wait to see how their friendship unfolded so became frustrated waiting for them to meet. The first part introduces you to each woman separately and their lives don’t intersect until the second part.
I didn’t connect with or particularly like either of the main characters. It’s weird, though, because I feel like I know them better than they know themselves and at the same time don’t really know them at all.
This book delves into grief and anger, and the frustration and pain that accompany them. One of the passages that has stayed with me speaks to how tiring grief is.
I didn’t spend time trying to figure out what was real and what was a symptom of mental illness. As far as I was concerned, it was all real to the main characters and so I took the position of going there with them to try to better understand them.
Favourite no context quote:
Thank you so much to Scribe Publications for the opportunity to read this book. I am rounding up from 3.5 stars.
Blog - https://schizanthusnerd.com
‘He built the world, and we both lived inside it. He made it up, and I believed him.’Animals have spoken to Yasuko since she was 13. Her son has recently left home.
‘I am scared that it is happening again.’When Dinah and Yasuko meet, they form a friendship, connected by their grief.
I was keen to explore the lives of these two women impacted by mental illness. Given the blurb and some early reviews, I was expecting magical realism and lines blurring reality and inner lives in turmoil.
I couldn’t wait to see how their friendship unfolded so became frustrated waiting for them to meet. The first part introduces you to each woman separately and their lives don’t intersect until the second part.
I didn’t connect with or particularly like either of the main characters. It’s weird, though, because I feel like I know them better than they know themselves and at the same time don’t really know them at all.
This book delves into grief and anger, and the frustration and pain that accompany them. One of the passages that has stayed with me speaks to how tiring grief is.
‘I think because when you lose someone, you have to relearn everything. You have to learn the whole world all over again. But the world without that person in it. That takes a lot of energy, and a very long time.’It’s possible I stayed too close to this story’s surface and that if I’d dived deeper I would have gotten more out of it. What I was most looking forward to once Yasuko was able to hear animals speaking again was learning what the dog she and her son used to see every night was saying. I acknowledge this misses the point of the entire book but that’s the type of reader that I am.
I didn’t spend time trying to figure out what was real and what was a symptom of mental illness. As far as I was concerned, it was all real to the main characters and so I took the position of going there with them to try to better understand them.
Favourite no context quote:
‘You need to stop beating yourself up. The world is doing a great job of that without your help.’Content warnings include .
Thank you so much to Scribe Publications for the opportunity to read this book. I am rounding up from 3.5 stars.
Blog - https://schizanthusnerd.com
April 21, 2024
I was captured by this book almost immediately and had high hopes for it. The characterisation was done well. I liked that it was set in Japan and detailed stuff like the transport system, the segregation of the English and Japanese teachers, the hole-in-the-wall food places and the descriptions of plants and trees.
Spoilers.
Dinah is young and has moved to Japan after her brother's death. She is struggling with teaching English, meeting people, having a healthy routine. When she meets Yasuko, a middle aged woman with Chanel this, Gucci that, and a Rolex watch (how???) she falls under her spell. Yasuko seems so together, so confident, although secretly she is missing her son, Jun, who has left their home without telling her where he's gone.
However, it takes quite a while to get Dinah to Yasuko and to unfold the narrative until it is clear who is suffering from outright grief and who has a mental illness. For me, because the book involves a lot of magical realism, I believed that Yasuko may have been a little like Howl in the Gwynn Jones book. I waited for her to do something incredible, but she, like Michael, has mental health issues.
After reading through it all I have come to the conclusion that, although mental health issues are all too often overlooked, badly handled, and a place of real suffering for the people who have them, this is mostly about Dinah and Jun. They are trying to repair themselves after years of fixing the person they love/d, but who is ill. No wonder Dinah stops eating, stops noticing the world around her, sleeps in the park, while Jun disappears and stops making contact. How does a Dinah or a Jun know who they are when all they've ever been is a bandage, a mirror, a shadow, a healer?
While I loved many aspects of this book I did feel that, like quite a lot of NZ literature, it veered towards the dark. Is the world a light place? No. Is it necessary to have so much sadness and pain in a book and then end on a child's suicide though? No. That bit seemed totally gratuitous.
Still, Smaill is an excellent writer, in my opinion the one to watch in this small fishpond if she steers away from the glum stuff that is so popular here.
Spoilers.
Dinah is young and has moved to Japan after her brother's death. She is struggling with teaching English, meeting people, having a healthy routine. When she meets Yasuko, a middle aged woman with Chanel this, Gucci that, and a Rolex watch (how???) she falls under her spell. Yasuko seems so together, so confident, although secretly she is missing her son, Jun, who has left their home without telling her where he's gone.
However, it takes quite a while to get Dinah to Yasuko and to unfold the narrative until it is clear who is suffering from outright grief and who has a mental illness. For me, because the book involves a lot of magical realism, I believed that Yasuko may have been a little like Howl in the Gwynn Jones book. I waited for her to do something incredible, but she, like Michael, has mental health issues.
After reading through it all I have come to the conclusion that, although mental health issues are all too often overlooked, badly handled, and a place of real suffering for the people who have them, this is mostly about Dinah and Jun. They are trying to repair themselves after years of fixing the person they love/d, but who is ill. No wonder Dinah stops eating, stops noticing the world around her, sleeps in the park, while Jun disappears and stops making contact. How does a Dinah or a Jun know who they are when all they've ever been is a bandage, a mirror, a shadow, a healer?
While I loved many aspects of this book I did feel that, like quite a lot of NZ literature, it veered towards the dark. Is the world a light place? No. Is it necessary to have so much sadness and pain in a book and then end on a child's suicide though? No. That bit seemed totally gratuitous.
Still, Smaill is an excellent writer, in my opinion the one to watch in this small fishpond if she steers away from the glum stuff that is so popular here.
July 27, 2023
This novel looks at the relationship between two women, one an older mother of Japanese origin and the other a younger girl from New Zealand. The two work together in a university teaching English as a foreign language to Japanese students. Both women have suffered losses in their lives, one losing her twin brother tragically young and the other suffering from empty nest syndrome as her son leaves home
As I started to read this book, I was quite confused about the novel,. Is it going to be a magical reality book where the main characters have some kind of special superpower.I took some time to realise that actually the superpower that they were discussing was mental illness. as a reader,you are never quite sure where occurrences being been described are real or imaginary. I think probably this is the strength of the book. The reader is never 100% sure if one of the characters has a special power
I had read the one of the authors previous novels, the chimes, which was on the book, a long list a few years back that book left me quite confused and I didn’t really like it
As much as I enjoyed this book
This novel is mainly a character lead novel. There relationships between the two women are the main focus of the story. I did believe that both the characters and they felt like real people I enjoyed the novels setting in Japan, which added extra interest of the story. The differences in the two women’s upbringings were notable.
The authors writing style is clear and easily read,the novel was an enjoyable read.
I read an early copy of the novel on NetGalley UK. The novel is published in the UK on the 9th of November 2023 by Scribe UK not a publisher had come across before.
This review will appear on NetGalley, UK, good reads and on my book blog, bionicsarahsbooks.wordpress.com and after publication on Amazon, UK
As I started to read this book, I was quite confused about the novel,. Is it going to be a magical reality book where the main characters have some kind of special superpower.I took some time to realise that actually the superpower that they were discussing was mental illness. as a reader,you are never quite sure where occurrences being been described are real or imaginary. I think probably this is the strength of the book. The reader is never 100% sure if one of the characters has a special power
I had read the one of the authors previous novels, the chimes, which was on the book, a long list a few years back that book left me quite confused and I didn’t really like it
As much as I enjoyed this book
This novel is mainly a character lead novel. There relationships between the two women are the main focus of the story. I did believe that both the characters and they felt like real people I enjoyed the novels setting in Japan, which added extra interest of the story. The differences in the two women’s upbringings were notable.
The authors writing style is clear and easily read,the novel was an enjoyable read.
I read an early copy of the novel on NetGalley UK. The novel is published in the UK on the 9th of November 2023 by Scribe UK not a publisher had come across before.
This review will appear on NetGalley, UK, good reads and on my book blog, bionicsarahsbooks.wordpress.com and after publication on Amazon, UK
May 24, 2024
Thank you to NetGalley and Scribe UK for providing me with an advanced copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.
Spoiler: Dreamy and disorienting.
This book was so intense in the best way. Both main characters, Dinah and Yasuko, were fighting their own emotions. They've both been through loss, and were struggling with grief and the weight of expectations. This created a kind of quiet madness for both of them. The author portrayed these very heavy emotions with such grace and such care.
The descriptions and vivid pictures really immersed me in the culture and essence of Japan. And yet, I found myself completely captivated my the two protagonists and the bond they formed.
Dinah was struggling after losing her twin brother. Having such a close relationship to him, losing him felt like she lost her own self. She considered him to be the special one in their dynamic, and after he was gone, she felt out of place.
Yasuko had the "power" to talk to animals, such a strong power that it caused her to isolate herself, and, in the end, to lose the people she cared about. I wish the booked explored a bit more of these powers, but I can understand the author's decision to remain vague.
What I really appreciated about the book is that it did not provide solutions for the women's struggles. But rather, I think the whole point of the story was to show a moment in time, to show their struggles with both the outside and inside world, as well as the impact they can have on others. So beautifully written, it showed the impact that a single person could have on your entire life.
Spoiler: Dreamy and disorienting.
This book was so intense in the best way. Both main characters, Dinah and Yasuko, were fighting their own emotions. They've both been through loss, and were struggling with grief and the weight of expectations. This created a kind of quiet madness for both of them. The author portrayed these very heavy emotions with such grace and such care.
The descriptions and vivid pictures really immersed me in the culture and essence of Japan. And yet, I found myself completely captivated my the two protagonists and the bond they formed.
Dinah was struggling after losing her twin brother. Having such a close relationship to him, losing him felt like she lost her own self. She considered him to be the special one in their dynamic, and after he was gone, she felt out of place.
Yasuko had the "power" to talk to animals, such a strong power that it caused her to isolate herself, and, in the end, to lose the people she cared about. I wish the booked explored a bit more of these powers, but I can understand the author's decision to remain vague.
What I really appreciated about the book is that it did not provide solutions for the women's struggles. But rather, I think the whole point of the story was to show a moment in time, to show their struggles with both the outside and inside world, as well as the impact they can have on others. So beautifully written, it showed the impact that a single person could have on your entire life.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
October 11, 2023
Published 9th November. This book has an almost dreamlike quality at times as we wander between the interior lives of Yasuko and Dinah, our main characters. Dinah has travelled from New Zealand to Japan to teach English in a Tokyo school. Yasuko teaches at the same school. Both women are suffering from loss - Dinah of her twin brother, Michael, who she was very close to and Yasuko of her son, Jun. Believing that Dinah has been sent to help her, Yasuko befriends her to try to get her to engage with Jun. When she was 13, Yasuko discovered that she could talk to animals, and they would tell her things. They told her that her mother would die and her father would not take her seriously - something that causes them to become estranged. Later when she is a single mother, she believes that her father is trying to take Jun from her and so runs away. Her 'powers' later return which causes Jun to leave home. Dinah finds it difficult to be in the world, even to be in her flat and so spends her nights sleeping on a bench in the park until Michael's presence comes to stay. As I said there is a magical realism quality to some of the events in this book and there is also, I believe, an exploration of mental illness. But - there is also a lot about how our relationships with others can affect us. Superbly crafted.
May 5, 2024
This is a beautifully written book about mental illness and the effect it has on the people closest to those suffering from it.
Dinah flees to Japan to teach English after the death of her gifted but tortured and mentally ill twin brother Michael. She exists in a fog of despair and depression, barely surviving until she meets the brilliant Yasuko who takes her under her wing and draws her into the sunlight.
Yasuko has become estranged from her son Jun and she asks Dinah to contact Jun to see if he will contact his mother. When Dinah and Jun meet, Dinah learns that Yasuko is also a lifelong sufferer of mental illness (she seems to be bipolar) and that Jun, like Dinah has spent his life at the mercy of his mother's delusions and deep depressions. At the age of 20 he had finally left in order to save his own sanity. Yasuko's mental illness has returned with Jun's departure but she seems to be in a high-energy manic state with the appearance of functioning.
Learning Jun's story allows Dinah to come to terms with her own trauma and start to step out from Michael's shadow and the cage of grief she has been trapped in. While Yasuko descends deeper into her delusional madness convinced that animals can talk to her.
Dinah flees to Japan to teach English after the death of her gifted but tortured and mentally ill twin brother Michael. She exists in a fog of despair and depression, barely surviving until she meets the brilliant Yasuko who takes her under her wing and draws her into the sunlight.
Yasuko has become estranged from her son Jun and she asks Dinah to contact Jun to see if he will contact his mother. When Dinah and Jun meet, Dinah learns that Yasuko is also a lifelong sufferer of mental illness (she seems to be bipolar) and that Jun, like Dinah has spent his life at the mercy of his mother's delusions and deep depressions. At the age of 20 he had finally left in order to save his own sanity. Yasuko's mental illness has returned with Jun's departure but she seems to be in a high-energy manic state with the appearance of functioning.
Learning Jun's story allows Dinah to come to terms with her own trauma and start to step out from Michael's shadow and the cage of grief she has been trapped in. While Yasuko descends deeper into her delusional madness convinced that animals can talk to her.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
September 28, 2023
Bird Life was kindly gifted to me as an advanced reader copy in exchange for a review.
Two women meet in Tokyo, both suffering with different types of grief and loss, both needing each other in their own ways, both making each other worse somehow. Bird Life is a poetic, lyrical, and ambitious exploration of grief, loss, and guilt.
A slow paced novel, the story drips languidly through the pages as Smaill spins a story exploring the experience of mental ill-health on both those afflicted and those on the periphery. Plot wise, not an awful lot happens - Dinah and Yasuko orbit around each other, one grieving the death of her brother, the other grieving the childhood of her son. World’s don’t so much collide as lightly bump against each other as the two women gently and inadvertently help each other process their individual losses.
Along the way we learn more of Yasuko’s family, of the strange power she believes she has, and of the strain this has inflicted on every aspect of her life.
Two women meet in Tokyo, both suffering with different types of grief and loss, both needing each other in their own ways, both making each other worse somehow. Bird Life is a poetic, lyrical, and ambitious exploration of grief, loss, and guilt.
A slow paced novel, the story drips languidly through the pages as Smaill spins a story exploring the experience of mental ill-health on both those afflicted and those on the periphery. Plot wise, not an awful lot happens - Dinah and Yasuko orbit around each other, one grieving the death of her brother, the other grieving the childhood of her son. World’s don’t so much collide as lightly bump against each other as the two women gently and inadvertently help each other process their individual losses.
Along the way we learn more of Yasuko’s family, of the strange power she believes she has, and of the strain this has inflicted on every aspect of her life.
Read
February 10, 2024This is one of those books that may not seem to infiltrate your mind and senses as you are reading, but it has a way of latching on, and days after you have finished, it still lingers.
I felt sometimes that I was unable to see through the story to its core, whether that was me or the book, I'm not entirely sure. But as I read further and my mind caught up to the story, I felt that it was so superbly written as to make the reader feel disconnected in parts, as this is what the characters were feeling.
The trauma of Dinah losing her brother and Yasuko seemingly losing herself and then her son was intricately woven throughout.
Their friendship may seem odd and unlikely, but they gave each other a small lifeline.
I felt sometimes that I was unable to see through the story to its core, whether that was me or the book, I'm not entirely sure. But as I read further and my mind caught up to the story, I felt that it was so superbly written as to make the reader feel disconnected in parts, as this is what the characters were feeling.
The trauma of Dinah losing her brother and Yasuko seemingly losing herself and then her son was intricately woven throughout.
Their friendship may seem odd and unlikely, but they gave each other a small lifeline.
February 16, 2024
What a glorious book! I've read so many books featuring mental illness that were tragic and so many others that were defensive. I've never before read anything where mental illness (as we might understand it) simply exists. Maybe it is a super power, maybe it is a tragedy. Maybe it is different things to different people, but it is a part of life.
I didn't realize until very late in the book what it was about Dinah that allowed her to connect so well with Yasuko and the whole book shifted open for me when I did. Until then it was a strange and interesting book about strange and interesting people. After, it became an open and nonjudgmental look at the very different ways these people were encountering life. I think I'll need to read it again. I know I'll want to.
I didn't realize until very late in the book what it was about Dinah that allowed her to connect so well with Yasuko and the whole book shifted open for me when I did. Until then it was a strange and interesting book about strange and interesting people. After, it became an open and nonjudgmental look at the very different ways these people were encountering life. I think I'll need to read it again. I know I'll want to.
June 29, 2024
Quite plodding in its narrative. I would be left mystified at how this writer was longlisted for a Booker for her previous work, but I typically disagree with their (the Booker Prize panel) choices - Amit Chaudhuri commented that "the idea that a 'book of the year' can be assessed annually by a bunch of people – judges who have to read almost a book a day – is absurd, as is the idea that this is any way of honouring a writer.", and Julian Barnes called the prize "posh bingo". In any case, that is a distraction from my opinion of this book, which is, it is not great. The writer seems to be trying to keep a foot in both camps, as a New Zealander and as a Japanese woman, and doesn't really succeed at either.
Read
May 13, 2024I really really struggled with this book. It's incredible in its brilliance for poetry and imagery and word use and someone with a better grasp of this type of language and prose would enjoy. I put stickers in about thirteen places because I loved the way the imagery was rendered eg 'the shadows moved across the wall like paint"
I liked the story and the characters, don't get me wrong. But, I really found my comprehension skills failed many times and it was often I had no idea what was being communicated. I admire Anna and, if she reads this review, know that I am in awe of her skill and talent but, like being a Māori who doesn't like seafood (me), this kind of novel is not to my taste.
I liked the story and the characters, don't get me wrong. But, I really found my comprehension skills failed many times and it was often I had no idea what was being communicated. I admire Anna and, if she reads this review, know that I am in awe of her skill and talent but, like being a Māori who doesn't like seafood (me), this kind of novel is not to my taste.
June 24, 2024
I loved this book. I enjoy books that explore a culture so different to what I am used to. They not only tell a story but open up a different world to. Its mystical, frank, and quite lovely. This is how I felt when I read this book.
Not to say difficult feelings and events were not explored, somehow Smaille managed to make for the reader a means of understanding pain, loneliness, being different, wanting too much.
Set in Japan, I couldn't imagine the story is any other setting, this gentle, ordered story is as much about how life is lived in Japan. The constraints, order, and gentleness.
Take time out to read this.
Not to say difficult feelings and events were not explored, somehow Smaille managed to make for the reader a means of understanding pain, loneliness, being different, wanting too much.
Set in Japan, I couldn't imagine the story is any other setting, this gentle, ordered story is as much about how life is lived in Japan. The constraints, order, and gentleness.
Take time out to read this.
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