Customer Reviews

Amrita

5 star:		(10)
4 star:		(6)
3 star:		(6)
2 star:		(4)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

This book pulled me in like none I had read before. Yoshimoto succeeds in making the reader part of the story, a story that can perhaps to some appear simplistic or uninteresting, but to others will certainly become magnetic as it recounts to them, through the unsophisticated yet magically beautiful words of a young Tokyo woman, their own most intimate experiences, thoughts, fears, hopes. Yoshimoto tells a story of self-discovery, and her great achievement lies in describing the simplest, everyday thoughts and feelings that most of us would be embarrassed to share with anyone for fear that they are too ordinary, that they are not profound enough, that they don't change the world. Yet Yoshimoto, by simply describing them, validates them, and makes them beautiful. Reading Amrita I was almost frightened by the image of myself that I saw in the pages. Unlike some other reviewers, I think that Amrita takes the unique, unpretentious narrative style developed in Kitchen and NP, and transforms it into a vehicle that takes the reader on an unforgettable, unpredictable journey. But it is a spiritual journey, a celebration of being human. In Amrita you won't find anything glamorous. The main character is a Japanese twenty-something who works in a neo-hippy bar and spends her time reading and watching TV. Her wisdom emerges in her reflections on the unusual world that surrounds her. Throughout the book, she remains a perfectly ordinary, typical person like any one of us. I am not surprised at the low ratings that some reviewers have given to this book. I can easily see how one might dislike it, not understand it. It is a perfect example of "either you hate it, or you love it." I love it. This book is very personal and if you can identify with Yoshimoto's voice, the young woman from Tokyo, you will be shaken to the core of your soul.

After I read Banana Yoshimoto's first novella Kitchen during the summer of 2001, I picked up each of her then available works in translation and devoured them voraciously. Unfortunately not one of her other novels, short stories, and novellas ever had that same gentle, dreamlike impact of Kitchen. I am not saying that I did not enjoy these other works, but as a whole they could never draw me into her fictional world with the same force and they lacked the same dreamlike quality that I found in her first thin tome that she penned in her early twenties. I found N.P. to be a bit forced and the short story collection Lizard to be a bit stale although there were a couple of true gems amongst the chunks of glass. Then there is her longest and possibly most convoluted novel Amrita which I have now read for the third time and for the first time in almost five years.

Penned in 1994 when Yoshimoto was thirty years old, Amrita centers on the female protagonist Sakumi. Sakumi is quite similar to the ordinary Yoshimoto protagonist: mid-twenties, pretty but not beautiful, and from an affluent albeit broken family. She spends a number of her days doing what a number of young women from similar backgrounds do: she shops at expensive boutiques, hangs out with her friends, and has long, leisurely dates with her boyfriend. However, there is one key element to Sakumi that differentiates her from her contemporaries: one day she split her head open when she fell on some steep steps which caused her mind to become a clean slate.

Working at a small bar called Berries and living with her "odd" family that consists of her mother, her cousin, her mother's best friend, and her little brother, Sakumi spends her days similar to the way that she did before, but with the added addition of suddenly recalling memories that remained deeply submerged in her unconsciousness. Many of these memories concern her dead sister Mayu, once a famous actress, who died years before in an accident related to alcohol and drug use. Beautiful and liked by everyone, the memory of Mayu hangs over Sakumi's family and the mind of Mayu's boyfriend Ryuichiro, a writer who after Mayu's death has become a globetrotter. With this deep shadow over her life, Sakumi spends the duration of the novels 366 pages trying to rediscover herself and helping her younger brother come to terms with his supernatural powers.

Amrita is definitely a convoluted work and the only glue that holds it together is the protagonist Sakumi, however, this does not mean that the book is just a rambling mess. With clean slate for a mind, Sakumi definitely has an interesting outlook towards life. She sees her family members in a completely new light and learns slowly bit by bit what makes each person important to her and how each person is a piece of the puzzle which is her memory. Like almost every other Yoshimoto novel, Amrita is tinged with melancholy and it can make the reader reflect on his or her own personal relations with family members and lovers and how his or her concepts of a person is completely made up of thoughts and memories and how truly tenuous these thoughts and memories are.

A good book overall, I believe that Amrita would be a good book to read for those who are familiar with some readers who are familiar with Yoshimoto's shorter pieces, but for a Yoshimoto novice, Kitchen would be a better starting point.

Banana Yoshimoto is -- by no stretch of doubt -- a gifted storyteller. She's also one of the best fiction writers today. Her stories are filled with eccentricity and magic. Amrita is not an exception.

The story is about Sakumi, a young woman who loses her memory after having lost her famous sister to suicide. With the help of her sister's lover, she is able to regain her memory, but she gets more than she bargains for. Like her previous efforts, Yoshimoto's focal point in this novel is self-discovery.

This is, by far, her best work since "Kitchen." I marvel at Banana's ability to touch people with her beautiful writing. A must-read!

Well, before I get influenced by any other reviews I wanted to give my two-bits worth. My first Yoshimoto Banana book. I was impressed by her ability to express sensations and feelings that we seldom have courage to bring to consciousness. Several times I found myself (especially towards the beginning) with that, 'wow, somebody else has felt that way too?' feeling. The things that meant the most to me in this book were the themes of remembering and loss. Her approach to these ideas, in a somewhat alternative, for lack of better terminology, way gave the book an expansive dimension, calling upon the reader to grow with her characters. I sensed, knowing a bit about the Japanese language, that there was a bit lost in the translation. I don't doubt that the translator was competent, but there were some points where simply the verbage could have been better and others where I felt the nuances of the original language were lost or even mis-expressed. Or maybe it was just my density. Anyway, I intend to read it again soon. And then probably again after that. A thoughtful, meaningful story.

When I read this book for the first time I was a freshman in High School and I have read it many times since then. I am now a sophmore in High School. I have never been more touched by a book in my entire life. Yoshimoto draws her readers into her stories, draining us of our emotion. We get so wrapped up with her characters that we forget about our own lives. Her books have helped shape who I am and I think that is for the better. I recommend this book to everyone.

i loved both kitchen and n.p., and had great hopes for the thicker amrita. however, when i first started reading it, i did not like it all, reading it was like riding a jigsaw rollercoaster! six months later i picked it up for lack of other reading, and i SO got into it. perhaps, i am not sure, the translator hasn't done a great job? i do not know japanese, so i don't know, but there are places in the novel where i just stop and stare and wonder HOW did this or that word happen HERE? since english is not my first language (but i do consider myself fluent) i tend to think of how i would have translated everything foreign that i read. anyway - the strength of the characters, the beauty of life and of japan as depicted by ms. yoshimoto have really inspired me during a rough spot in my life. the book brought back passion in a way that i haven't felt since i was 17 and duras and sagan were my godesses! so, needless to say, i cannot wait for more banana yoshimoto in translation!

Banana Yoshimoto is an excellent storyteller. I can say she's my favorite author. I'm writing a review for a book report, and Banana's style of writing is not new to me, because I've read many other books of hers. This book in particular has amazed me because of the whole idea of the book. Banana has a rather out of the ordinary imagination, but at the same time, very meaningful and passionate. It's extraordinary how Banana describes Sakumi's (the narrator's) feelings about her younger sister's death and how she lost her memory when she smashed her head falling down the stairs. Banana centers her main idea and starting point of her books on atleast one death that bring the characters in the story to show their feelings about it and come together in a unison. Like in Amrita, Sakumi has suffered from the loss of her younger sister, Mayu, in a car accident, and when she lost her memory, she realized how her sister was important to her and what her sister truly meant for her. Sakumi afterwards falls in love with Ryuichiro, Mayu's lover. Ryuichiro is a cult writer and goes around the world in search for new ideas and materials to write his next novel. At one point in the story, he asked Sakumi to go with him to the island of Saipan to meet some very special friends of his. Sakumi falls in love for the gorgeous landscape of the ocean. Yoshio, Sakumi's younger brother, came over to Saipan also, after some problems with school. Sakumi was worried about him because he was developing super-natural powers and couldn't get along with other kids in regular school, so she invited him to enjoy the beautiful landscape along with her. Banana describes her characters and places like a lyric poem, with a fine mixture of adjectives. This talent has struck me deeply and I could picture Saipan in my mind. Banana also chooses some very interesting titles for her book. The word Amrita comes the old Sanskrit word "amrta", and it is a divine nectar, something the gods indulged. When they drank this liquid, they actually achieved life. Throughout the book, the reader will surely understand why. This is a brilliant and capturing book and I loved it. I leave it to you now to reveal the secret.

The title of this book turned me on to the fiction of Banana Yoshimoto. Somehow I missed Bananamania. What a great discovery to make, no matter how late. Banana Yoshimoto reminds me of Richard Brautigan. I'm not sure why. Perhaps it is the deceptively simple prose. More likely it is the powerful sense of the implied author. By the time you finish the book, you feel as though you can call her Banana, that you would like to call Banana and make a date for tea or something. I read the book on Christmas morning while I was stranded far from home and being in Banana's Japan was oddly comforting. Sorry if this review doesn't give you much of a clue what the book is about. The style and tone and sense of the implied author are far more important. I'd like to go to Japan, now, and call up Banana Yoshimoto, get together and talk about Richard Brautigan when he was in Japan.

"Amrita" is a long and wispy journey of sorrow, spirits, beer, and ramen. The novel focuses on a woman named Sakumi, the ultimate "modern" character who contemplates issues of death, spirituality, and aloneness while furiously trying to recover her memory, which was lost in a fall down a cement staircase.

At moments, this novel is so beautiful you wish you were Sakumi, without memory and with only a little clairvoyant Yoshio to hang around with. But these moments fill up maybe a third of the novel, while the other two thirds consist of repetitious philosophy and Sakumi's rather contrived self-revelations. There were several times when a chapter would end and I'd swear I had read the same paragraph a few chapters ago.

The descriptions of Saipan and Kochi are beautiful; the strange and telling dreams Sakumi has are lovely. Even moments of everyday happenings are appealing when Yoshimoto writes them - sipping "golden beer," eating ramen at midnight when Yoshio has school the next day, the mother blowing up at her family because she wants so badly to go to Paris. All of these moments are wonderful, but they are separated by so much needless reflection on what it means to lose memory, what it means to gain memory, and how much of the self is made of memory that it seems like Yoshimoto couldn't quite put her intentions into words and wrote around her ideas ad nauseum to make up for it.

Also, I longed for more emphasis on the strange family Sakumi belonged to and fewer random, underdeveloped and untrustworthy characters like Noodles and Mr. Mesmer. These relationship were never fully developed and they did not advance the plot or bring to light any new philosophies. I was also surprised by how little the recent death of Mayu seemed to affect the lives of this family; and with all of the spiritual revelations, I would have expected an encounter between Sakumi and Mayu.

Overall, though the novel had some beautiful sections, it lacked a strong emotional arc. It doesn't hold together well as a novel. Rather, I can see pieces of this story broken into short stories that would be presented as a collection. Despite this criticism, the novel is worth reading for the interesting characters Sakumi and Yoshio, and for the fantastic scenes in Kochi and Saipan. It makes me, an American, long for a place as filled with spirits as the islands around Japan.

Banana Yoshimoto's Kitchen is one of my favorite books, and Asleep was great also, but Amrita is not one that I would recommend for anyone just testing the Banana Yoshimoto waters. The theme of the book is fine, and the style is the familiar Yoshimoto sweet, full of emotion, sometimes of supernatural-feeling style, but overall this book was a bit strange and wandering. I think it needed a huge edit to really achieve the story that she wanted.

If you just have to read everything by Banana Yoshimoto, then I would read this one also, but if you don't have time to read everything in the world, then I would skip this one and move on to Haruki Murakami, another wonderful Japanese author with an other-worldly feel to his writing. The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle and Wild Sheep Chase are really neat.