肉骨茶

Akaiko, seventeen, stands 160 centimetres tall and weighs 35 kilograms. She does not binge and purge; she simply refuses food, pours the lunches her mother makes down the toilet and, if she cannot avoid swallowing something, keeps on the move to burn it off, though the story never says why. Travelling with her mother on a tour of Singapore and Malaysia, she carries out a long-laid plan, slipping off at the border to meet her friend Zooey and hide at Zooey's villa by the sea. There Zooey's ordinary kindness, her constant offers of food, closes in on her, with Zooey's driver Abdul and Koichi, a childhood friend of Zooey's, close by; and from time to time Akaiko tenses her belly and gives a strange, wordless howl.

AI-generated summary

About the book

Form

Novella

Length

123 pages in the original

Genres

Coming of age (assigned by AI)

Set in

Singapore, Malaysia

First published

2012 by Shinchosha

Author's age

20 when first published

ISBN

9784103335214 (original)