
It tells the story of Thomas Tessler, a man who has
essentially been a shut-in for the past three years since the death of his son.
He occasionally comes out of his room and into the world in the wee hours of
morning, when the sun is barely out, to the local grocery store to buy some
food. He is a hikikomori.
At her wit’s end, Silke, Thomas’s wife decides to hire
Megumi, a young woman who understands the hikikomori
phenomenon to help lure Thomas out,
back into the world.
Told from two perspectives, Thomas’s and a third person
narrator’s, Hikikomori and the Rental
Sister is a soft, finely attuned novel about overcoming tragedy to find the
beauty in life again. The writing is beautiful too, as evidenced by this quote:
“These cups are over one hundred years old,” Megumi says. Foreigners never understand the significance, but she says it anyway. It’s not that the age itself is important or that one hundred years is particularly old, but that for one hundred years people have been sitting across from each other drinking tea out of these same cups, a long string of moments that have come and gone never to return, and in that whole time the only thing that hasn’t changed is the cups.
Backhaus’ writing is sparse, very minimalistic, rarely
flowery and it’s the simplicity of everything that increases the impact of the
story. The story is a very simple one- the story of how a woman helps a shut-in
man discover the world again, devoid of overly complex plots and story lines,
but Backhaus manages to lead the reader onto such an emotional ride. At times,
I felt like I wanted to cry, such was the genius of Backhaus’ writing.
The ending was fitting and despite the fact that I didn’t
like it originally, I soon saw that it was the perfect ending. The way it ended
(I won’t spoil it for you here) made such an impact. It was so… beautiful.
The way that it portrayed Asian society, whether Korean
(Megumi is half Korean and half Japanese) or Japanese was pitch perfect.
Megumi often says that she has a hard time finding the English equivalent for
a Japanese term but through Backhaus’ delicate sketch, the Asian society comes
alive. It’s hard for me to describe it but somehow Hikikomori and the Rental Sister captured it. There are certain
quirks that Western authors sometimes miss but Backhaus got it. He even brought
in the atmosphere (here is where I
struggle for words. It’s not because I’m Asian but because it’s just a feeling that’s hard to form into words.)
Overall, I loved Hikikomori
and the Rental Sister which was so
simple yet so deep. These kinds of novels are my favorite and I liked Hikikomori and the Rental Sister even
more because it captured that Asian essence.

P.S It wasn't until when I sat down to write the review for this novel that I realized how genius the cover was. Hikikomori is a person who shuts themselves away from the world and by taking the first two letters of the word, you get the word “Hi”, which means that the person isn’t shutting themselves off. The designers at Algonquin, you guys are geniuses!
Review copy provided by the publisher
Wow, your review has convinced me to add this to the TBR ASAP! The writing sounds phenomenal.
ReplyDeleteThank you! I hope you like it as much as I did!
ReplyDelete