Status
Available
Call number
Publication
Doubleday [First Edition]
Pages
336
Description
"In Japan, a covert industry has grown up around the "wakaresaseya" (literally "breaker-upper"), a person hired by one spouse to seduce the other in order to gain the advantage in divorce proceedings. When Sato hires Kaitaro, a wakaresaseya agent, to have an affair with his wife, Rina, he assumes it will be an easy case. But Sato has never truly understood Rina or her desires and Kaitaro's job is to do exactly that--until he does it too well. While Rina remains ignorant of the circumstances that brought them together, she and Kaitaro; fall in a desperate, singular love, setting in motion a series of violent acts that will forever haunt her daughter's life. Told from alternating points of view and across the breathtaking landscapes of Japan, Stephanie Scott exquisitely renders the affair and its intricate repercussions. As Rina's daughter, Sumiko, fills in the gaps of her mother's story and her own memory, Scott probes the thorny psychological and moral grounds of the actions we take in the name of love, asking where we draw the line between passion and possession"--… (more)
Collection
Language
Original language
English
Physical description
336 p.; 9.5 inches
ISBN
0385544707 / 9780385544702
Similar in this library
User reviews
LibraryThing member brangwinn
I learned a lot in this book. In Tokyo during the early 1990’s a wakaresaseya (agent hired to break up a marriage) has bee hired by a salaryman to seduce his wife, Rina. Surprisingly, Kaitaro doesn’t just break up the marriage, he and Rina fall in love. Mistakes in their relationship lead to
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Rina death. Rina’s father and daughter are the ones who must deal with the aftermath. The story works backwards as the daughter pieces together what happened. And in the search, Sumiko, the daughter tries to create her own identity. I would call this an intelligent mystery. I love books that take me farther into another culture. Show Less
LibraryThing member SamSattler
I was intrigued by Stephanie Scott’s debut novel, What’s Left of Me Is Yours, as soon as I read a very brief synopsis of the book’s plot. One strange-looking word in the plot summary jumped out at me: “wakaresaseya.” That turns out to be a Japanese word whose English equivalent is
“Lies, when they are told, have a shadow quality to them, a gossamer texture that can wrap around a life. They have that feather-light essence of childhood, and my childhood was built on lies.” Page 12
What’s Left of Me Is Yours is divided into five distinct parts, each of them at least partially narrated through the eyes of Sumiko, a young woman who until very recently has believed that her mother had been killed in an automobile accident when Sumiko was just seven years old. Since her parents’ divorce and her mother’s death, Sumiko has been raised by her maternal grandfather, Yoshi, a man who has kept the truth of her mother’s murder from her for the last fifteen years. But it all begins to unravel for Yoshi on the morning that Sumiko hears something on the phone that makes her wonder about everything she thinks she knows about her mother’s death – and what happened afterward.
Scott skillfully uses a series of flashbacks to explain how the relationship between Rina (Sumiko’s mother) and Kaitaro (the wakaresaseya agent) began only when the little girl’s father hired Kaitaro to seduce his wife. Seeking an advantage in the divorce proceedings he planned, Sata would use the resulting evidence of her affair to coerce his wife into giving him everything he demanded rather than suffer the public humiliation of her affair. What Sata did not count on was the wakaresaseya agent falling totally and madly in love with his wife, and her with him.
And what Sumiko’s grandfather did not count on was his adult granddaughter using her recently acquired law license to investigate her mother’s death – and the actions of everyone involved in the case, including him- and where that investigation would ultimately lead her.
“That afternoon, alone on the floor of my grandfather’s study, looking at those words, I realized that of all the lies we are told, the very best ones are close to the truth.” Page 58
Bottom Line: What’s Left of Me Is Yours is a complex thriller hinging on one woman’s quest to learn the “truth” about her mother’s death. It is also an excellent character study in which it soon becomes obvious that there is no single truth to be discovered, that each of the people who knew her mother best at the time of her death have their own versions of that truth. And now, what Sumiko chooses to do with all that she learns will set the course of the rest of her life. Her innocence is gone forever.
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something like “breaker-upper.” As it turns out, there were almost 300 wakaresaseya agencies operating in Japan in 2010 through which special agents could be hired to give advantage to one partner in divorce proceedings by providing evidence of having successfully seduced the unknowing party. The wakaresaseya industry took a hit in 2010 when one of the agents was convicted of murdering a woman he had seduced on behalf of her husband, but it is said to be doing rather well even today. What’s Left of Me Is Yours is based on that 2010 murder case.“Lies, when they are told, have a shadow quality to them, a gossamer texture that can wrap around a life. They have that feather-light essence of childhood, and my childhood was built on lies.” Page 12
What’s Left of Me Is Yours is divided into five distinct parts, each of them at least partially narrated through the eyes of Sumiko, a young woman who until very recently has believed that her mother had been killed in an automobile accident when Sumiko was just seven years old. Since her parents’ divorce and her mother’s death, Sumiko has been raised by her maternal grandfather, Yoshi, a man who has kept the truth of her mother’s murder from her for the last fifteen years. But it all begins to unravel for Yoshi on the morning that Sumiko hears something on the phone that makes her wonder about everything she thinks she knows about her mother’s death – and what happened afterward.
Scott skillfully uses a series of flashbacks to explain how the relationship between Rina (Sumiko’s mother) and Kaitaro (the wakaresaseya agent) began only when the little girl’s father hired Kaitaro to seduce his wife. Seeking an advantage in the divorce proceedings he planned, Sata would use the resulting evidence of her affair to coerce his wife into giving him everything he demanded rather than suffer the public humiliation of her affair. What Sata did not count on was the wakaresaseya agent falling totally and madly in love with his wife, and her with him.
And what Sumiko’s grandfather did not count on was his adult granddaughter using her recently acquired law license to investigate her mother’s death – and the actions of everyone involved in the case, including him- and where that investigation would ultimately lead her.
“That afternoon, alone on the floor of my grandfather’s study, looking at those words, I realized that of all the lies we are told, the very best ones are close to the truth.” Page 58
Bottom Line: What’s Left of Me Is Yours is a complex thriller hinging on one woman’s quest to learn the “truth” about her mother’s death. It is also an excellent character study in which it soon becomes obvious that there is no single truth to be discovered, that each of the people who knew her mother best at the time of her death have their own versions of that truth. And now, what Sumiko chooses to do with all that she learns will set the course of the rest of her life. Her innocence is gone forever.
Show Less
LibraryThing member ShannonRose4
How do I write a review for a book that is so descriptive and beautiful that it seems to have been an opera whispered?
This story is so meticulous researched that you forget that this a novel; a story of a family and love so masterfully woven you forget the crime.
A stunning debut of the many
This story is so meticulous researched that you forget that this a novel; a story of a family and love so masterfully woven you forget the crime.
A stunning debut of the many
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shades of love & how the best of lies are told nearest to truth. Show Less
LibraryThing member ShannonRose4
How do I write a review for a book that is so descriptive and beautiful that it seems to have been an opera whispered?
This story is so meticulous researched that you forget that this a novel; a story of a family and love so masterfully woven you forget the crime.
A stunning debut of the many
This story is so meticulous researched that you forget that this a novel; a story of a family and love so masterfully woven you forget the crime.
A stunning debut of the many
Show More
shades of love & how the best of lies are told nearest to truth. Show Less
LibraryThing member flourgirl49
Started out slow but won me over. Really quite a beautiful story.
Awards
Authors' Club First Novel Award (Longlist — 2021)
Call number
FIC J Sco