The Premonition

A Novel

By: Banana Yoshimoto

Narrated by: Kathleen Li

Yayoi, a nineteen-year-old woman from a seemingly loving middle-class family, has lately been haunted by the feeling that she has forgotten something important from her childhood. Her premonition grows stronger day by day and, as if led by it, she decides to move in with her mysterious aunt, Yukino.

No one understands her aunt's unusual lifestyle. For as long as Yayoi can remember, Yukino has lived alone in an old gloomy single-family home, quietly, almost as though asleep. When she is not working, Yukino spends all day in her pajamas, clipping her nails and trimming her split ends. She eats only when she feels like it, and she often falls asleep lying on her side in the hallway. She sometimes wakes Yayoi at 2:00 a.m. to be her drinking companion, sometimes serves flan in a huge mixing bowl for dinner, and watches Friday the 13th over and over to comfort herself. A child study desk, old stuffed animals—things Yukino wants to forget—are piled up in her backyard like a graveyard of her memories.

An instant bestseller in Japan when first published in 1988, The Premonition is finally available in English, translated by the celebrated Asa Yoneda.

©1988 Banana Yoshimoto; Translation copyright 2023 by Asa Yoneda (P)2023 HighBridge, a division of Recorded Books

Enjoyed the audiobook

I enjoyed this story, getting a glimpse of a point in time of the main character as she learns the truth of her family. I loved hearing the narration by Kathleen.

A dreamworld that wasn’t meant to be.

Banana Yoshimoto’s lyrical, poetic writing would usually be enough to transport anyone to a gauzy, mysterious Japan, tiptoeing towards the financial strife of the 90s not fully realizing the fever dream of the bubble era was coming to an end. This should have been a magical work, but I’m sad to say it fell far short of my expectations, The English translation was satisfactory, if unremarkable. The main problem is the performer. Mrs. Li, while no doubt talented, was a baffling choice for this piece. Yayoi is a budding clairvoyant savant, blossoming into womanhood under the most peculiar of circumstances, and why Mrs. Li chose to read her like a valley girl trying to cover up a smoking habit was vexing from the first moment to the last. There was so much space to give life to the mystery of Yoshimoto’s prose, but it was repeatedly trampled by the performer’s insistence on raising her voice at the end of every quote, and a gravelly, unappealing cadence through all the narration. Yoshimoto’s dream world was a bubble that was popped thoughtlessly from the first page. I first read this 10 years ago in Italian as “presagio triste” and I’m embarrassed to say I scarcely remember it because it was such a milky and forlorn experience it was like dreaming while awake. As I recall it won several awards, and yet I’m afraid between the “good enough” English translation and this abysmal performance, it will not garner similar acclaim. It’s tragic… I’ve read parts of it in Japanese, and in Italian, and in those languages it floats majestically like a jellyfish in the sea. This translation and performance make this lovely gem of a book appear like a jellyfish washed up on the shore, squished into an unremarkable oblivion.

Do not recommend

What a boring story. Did not care for the narration either. It didn’t feel like it fit. Maybe it was the translation, but I don’t think so.