Amrita

By: Banana Yoshimoto

Narrated by: Alexandra Bailey

Banana Yoshimoto's warm, witty, and heartfelt depictions of the lives of young Japanese have earned her international acclaim and best-seller status as well as a place among the best of contemporary Japanese literature. In Amrita, when a celebrated actress dies under shocking circumstances, she leaves behind an older sister, Sakumi, who suffers from memory loss in the wake of an accident. Struggling to remember whom she loves and what she lost, Sakumi embarks on a unique emotional journey, accompanied by her dead sister's lover and her clairvoyant kid brother. In Amrita, Yoshimoto proves, once again, her prowess as an imaginative-yet-grounded storyteller as she takes Sakumi - and listeners - on a compelling expedition through grief, dreams, and shadows, to a place of transformation and discovery.

©1988 Banana Yoshimoto. English translation Fukutake Publishing Co., Ltd., through the Japan Foreign-Rights Centre. Translation 1993 by Megan Backus. (P)2015 Audible, Inc.

Critic reviews

"Entering Banana Yoshimoto's fictional world is a little like living as an expatriate in Tokyo - everyday things are disconcertingly different. The exotic lurks around every corner.... Amrita is difficult to forget." (San Francisco Chronicle)

"Yoshimoto's most fully realized work to date.... Her firm grasp of her characters, her surefooted prose and her wide-eyed exploration of everything from American pop culture to the Japanese language make this one of the most satisfying books of the summer." (Time Out New York)

Kind of ethereal - appealed to my taste

The reviews for this are from 1 to 5 stars, perhaps because it won't appeal to some people. The main character, Sakumi, is a young woman who has suffered the loss of her younger sister, and experiences memory loss after an accident. There is also an otherworldly feeling with people who have supernatural powers. It's not anything extreme like a Stephen King novel, but it is an integral part of the book. The plot isn't the strongest, but this book is about so much more than plot.

I've loved Japanese literature since I was first able to get some books in my mid-twenties. Most of those books were written just post WWII through the 1970s. This book has some of what appealed to me back then - the beautifully written passages about sad events and feelings. The joyous events and mediocre ones written about with the same care. This is only my second book by Banana Yoshimoto and I'm not done.

There are people saying that she apologized for this novel. I didn't delve too much into that, but no apology needed for me. Humility is very much part of the Japanese culture so perhaps that was why.

I don't think everyone would like this book. It's not a plot driven novel. It is a little weird. If you like quirky books with an ethereal quality then this could be to your liking.

I love the narration. It fits the book perfectly.

tedious

So many dreams, conversations, chance encounters, inexplicable coincidences, and yet this book has no magic

Not one of the best books by a Japanese writer

The author contradicts herself alot. It also feels like maybe this was originally not a novel, but a series for a magazine. The narrator was amazing.

Narrator performance is not for me. It destroys the entire story and flared up a case of tinnitus... 🦻😣

The story is very interesting. I can't finish. The narrator 's reading and performance is on the verge of driving me to insanity, tinnitus attacks and misery.

Her reading reminds me of 1990s cartoon characters like "Daria," but at least Daria wasn't interested in people , and was never going to read anyone any book. Well, in her performance there is that unmistakable (sorry to say this) very 1990s American popular culture staple of the cynical and unamused. More than that, it's that teenage, "My So-Called Life," never-amused attitude whose tone expresses only a few main messages: " I don't care." "Don't bother me." "I'm better than you." "Everyone sucks." Yes, that's the " vibes" or in 2024, the "vibez" I'm picking up.



This is a Japanese book, and so I imagine when it was written the characters are not intended to have this cynical, bored, sarcastic, or pained tone to their voices or attitude in their delivery of lines if they could speak. I can't distinguish which character is speaking, sometimes.
This narrator might be good reading some Gen Z hit like Crazy Rich Asians.
I can't finish this. People buy Audible to relax, sometimes because of time or health issues.
I will return, buy the book, and wait for a chance to read it so the author's work actually enters my mind through my own filters and understandings, and doesn't feel like I'm watching a scene from Pulp Fiction. Sorry, narrator, if you read this and it's a criticism. Maybe I'm too sensitive to such things, so maybe it's my fault. But I truly believe this is the case, at least for me. I just hated how it's being performed and can't continue. Want back my credit.