Japanese Literature discussion

Our June Book Club discussion is about There's No Such Thing as an Easy Job by Kikuko Tsumura. Originally published in Japanese in 2016. Translated by Polly Barton.

Tsumura has won numerous Japanese literary awards (the Noma Literary New Face Prize, the Dazai Osamu Prize, the Kawabata Yasunari Prize, and the Oda Sakunosuke Prize), including the Akutagawa Prize, for her 2009 novel Potosu raimu no fune (The Lime Pothos Boat). There’s No Such Thing as an Easy Job is her first novel to be translated into English.

From an NPR review, a comment on Ms. Barton's British English translation choices:
Polly Barton's British translation, having words such as a total tip (a complete mess); was not half convenient (was very convenient); moreish (tasty); skiver (a job shirker); and put paid to (finish) serves as a weirdly appropriate lens to approach the novel. This double distancing effect — British flavor imposed on a Japanese oeuvre — encourages us to imagine the voice of Tsumura's narrator/avatar as both cheeky and self-deprecating, the perfect balance to wage a stealth feminist revolution.

A link to the full review by Thụy Đình, the editor of Asymptote Journal: https://www.npr.org/2021/03/25/980832...

A transcript of a May 24, 2021 interview with Tsumura, facilitated by Barton. https://therumpus.net/2021/05/the-rum...

Japan Times review, including quotes from Barton and Tsumura. https://www.japantimes.co.jp/culture/...

I'm setting up our thread a couple of days early in order to avoid doing so late.

Who plans to join?

I read it and enjoyed it, but expected more somehow. Curious how people will find it, liked the first story with the kind of scary surveillance most

I am only now buying the book, but I heard good things about it, so I will come back to this thread later on. Hopefully, I won't be very late!

Currently reading it. I'm on the beginning of her third "job" - I laughed at the part she and her recruiter are discussing what transpired with her predecessor.

What our jobs asks of us. Ah, Happy Friday!

I was trying to make this book last by reading a job per day, but ended up reading the final three in one sitting. Oops. I noticed the decision to keep the British terms in the US release, but it didn't particularly bother me... I have a bad habit of ordering books from the UK when I can't bear to wait for US releases.

I really enjoyed it, with my one small grievance being the ending– I think I would've much preferred a more ambiguous, open ending versus its neat resolution (which, to be fair, made complete sense and was foreshadowed at several points). That's very much a "me" issue though and I do appreciate that it tackled unhealthy work culture and burnout.

I really loved the sense of anticipation that built within every job– not quite heavy enough to call suspense, but the feeling that at any point things could take a turn for the weird or unconventional.

Of all the jobs... I think the only one I'd pass up would be the postering job. Not a fan of pestering people, haha. Which ones would you all try out or pass up?

Carol wrote: "Our June Book Club discussion is about There's No Such Thing as an Easy Job by Kikuko Tsumura. Originally published in Japanese in 2016. Translated by [author:Polly..."

Thanks for always taking the trouble to write up these intros!

Emily wrote: "I was trying to make this book last by reading a job per day, but ended up reading the final three in one sitting. Oops. I noticed the decision to keep the British terms in the US release, but it d..."

I don't know if I agree with Emily about the ending. It certainly tied up a bit more neatly than a lot of recent Japanese novels, but (view spoiler)[I liked the idea that she's basically doing social work at all of her jobs. It feeds into my sense of self that there's some skill/vocation/passion inside of us that adds direction to our lives. (hide spoiler)]

I reviewed this one for Asian Review of Books . I stick by my assertion that (view spoiler)["In the end, there are no easy jobs for the narrator because her deepest desire is to do her best at what she loves—even if nothing changes about the unsustainable conditions that forced her to quit in the first place." Perhaps that is the ambiguity/social commentary: we live in a self-reinforcing, unsustainable workforce where people work hard and companies have no real incentive to improve. (hide spoiler)]

I've also written about the third job hanging posters as an expression of Japanese anxiety about cults, if that's of interest to anyone.

Alison wrote: "Carol wrote: "Our June Book Club discussion is about There's No Such Thing as an Easy Job by Kikuko Tsumura. Originally published in Japanese in 2016. Translated by..."

You’re welcome, Alison. It’s a rabbit hole of joy for me.

Well, I got this one and started it today. I’ve already finished the first job and am so far enjoying it. I’ll give a more informed opinion as I go along.

I've been slacking on this one, but I promised I've started it. I'm still on first job, but so far it seems like a standard slice-of-life type book, which I usually enjoy a lot. So high hopes!

This was a fun book. It's strange to read so many pages with so little substance though.

I made a late start on it yesterday, and finished job number this morning.

Oddly, it took me 30 pages to realize the narrator was a man. I tend to assume the MC is the same sex as the author until told otherwise.

Something doesn't add up job number one. Two people are at work watching this guy. There are 24x7 hours in a week, cut down to 16x7 after you exclude sleep, cut down to 8x7=56 because they're allowed two monitors each with different time periods on them. So why are these two people working excessive overtime when between them they only need to pull 56 hours a week?

This first job really captures the feeling of tedious, meticulous work, though. My job isn't ever quite that tedious, but I can identify with it.

Bill wrote: "Oddly, it took me 30 pages to realize the narrator was a man. I tend to assume the MC is the same sex as the author until told otherwise."

I’m almost finished with the book. And the narrator is not a man. She’s made reference to being a woman in her thirties a couple of times (36 I believe). If you’re referring to the line where they talk about putting people under surveillance of the same sex in the first job, they say that is what they “usually” do, making it odd that they didn’t for her first job, but that seems to be the reason for that “usually” clarification.

I read it and was thinking, what, the main character is a guy?? 😅

^ This debate has made me more interested in continuing haha.

@Henk

Did you read it in English?

Yes English. To specify: I read the comment here on the forum in respect to the MC, and then thought back to reading experience of the book, when I was 100% sure she was a woman.

Finally on page 219, at the end of chapter 3, we get told that the MC is a woman.

I think it would have been apparent in Japanese, and was far more subtle in the translation.

(I was tempted to put a spoiler tag around this post)

I just finished it. I honestly was really enjoying this from the start. I found the first job interesting, the second a delightful bit of possible magical realism, the third extremely entertaining and the fourth darkly fascinating. I was about ready to give it four or possibly even five stars as I was just enjoying it all around. Then the final job hit and had it been a short story collection I would have given that section one… maybe two stars if I was being generous. I didn't find the cast of that section interesting (in contrast I loved most of the characters we were introduced to in the other jobs), I found the main focus of the job tedious, the mystery aspect boring and the end a bit on the preachy side.

The book is very readable and an easy going sort of read. It's not a book I would care to analyze as it really is just the sort of thing I'd read to relax and turn off my brain just a bit. It's a book that at times feels like it's about nothing in particular and has little in terms of "action" going on… but it's consistently enjoyable (until that last job) and was always holding my interest. It's not a book I can recommend to everyone, but I do not regret my time with it. I only wish that last job was more interesting, then it could have had a much higher rating. Still, with the four jobs prior to that last, it still gets a 3/5 stars.

I just finished it. It was a very quick, light read.

My favorites were numbers two and three. I was really hoping she would stick with those jobs, despite the fact that the format of the book tells me in advance she won't. Surely she could have continued doing bus ads part of the time if she transferred to another department in that company, as people in the neighborhood dropped ads from time to time. And I think her anxiety at the cracker company would have decreased if only she'd waited for her coworker to come back so she had someone to share the load with and brainstorm with.

Number one was my least favorite, because there were too many implausible elements. The amount of time needed for the task (as I said before) and the legal aspect both make me doubt it. Why is it they can get a warrant to install camera in the guy's apartment, but not a warrant to search the premises for contraband?

I was expecting a different, better ending to number four. For most of the story it seemed to me that her suspicions about "Lonely no more!" were baseless and she was developing a rival in her own mind as she got more into the job. I hoped "Lonely no more!" had been a completely innocuous outfit, and her realizing this in the end caused her to lose self-confidence and quit the job.

I found number five weak for a different reason than Tim. The others concentrate on the details of what sort of work she was doing, but in this one it doesn't. Her job is just to perforate tickets, which isn't anything she can obsess and/or worry about, so it barely takes up any space in the story. And without that ending, she could have written a sequel!

I enjoyed Polly Barton's other translations more (Spring Garden, and Where the Wild Ladies Are). She includes far more Britishisms in this one, even where dialect-neutral terms would have fit just fine. I think translators should expect their translations to be sold globally and plan them accordingly.

I finished this book in 3 major sittings spaced over 3 days. Didn't really expect to finish it so quickly or be so engrossed.

I was intrigued by the description because I have had doubts about my own career path lately and I have a friend who I fear like the protagonist's ex colleague has burned out but is still continuing in the same job umable to quit. Oddly enough, the protagonist's escapades shifting from one odd job to the other were a bit reassuring in the sense that there are ways to survive and take time off and think and career doubts may not always lead you on a downward spiral.

These motivations aside, I enjoyed the book. It was a light and easy read. I loved the rice cracker job. But didn't you feel like her anxiety and fears really made her blow things out of proportion? Clearly the first job demanded her to be on guard. But the businesses appearing and disappearong, lonely no more and the person living in the park pieces felt like the author just wanted there to be more to each job than there really was for the sake of giving the story some content. I did like the tinge of loneliness, self-doubt and a sense of being lost that stayed throughout because I feel that it was representative of the anxities we all face. The example of the person living in the forest really showed how no major event is required to throw you off balance. And seemingly distant things like a celebrity sportsperson's mysterious temporary retirement can thrpw you off balance because we often dont realize how heavily we rely on the mundane and not seemingly related to our lives stuff to help maintain our sanity.

3.5/5stars!