All the Lovers in the Night is a brilliantly written examination into what it is like to feel like in eternal outsider in your life. Fuyuko is introverted and allowing life to pass her by. She works as a freelance proofreader and likes her job just enough but doesn't necessarily have the most intimate personal relationships. Kawakami writes about this character who drinks away her loneliness with the same warmth as a cup of tea. This story was extremely insightful and full of heart. However, at times it felt like I was trudging through certain passages. I was having a hard time at making a distinction between this and Breasts and Eggs. Overall, I love her writing and the world she creates, but it just didn't have enough fuel to keep me engaged.

Okay, it seems like an unpopular opinion, but I didn't really enjoy this book. And I feel sorry because I really thought I'd like it.
Why?
Because I love the title, it's kind of poetic.
The protagonist is a recluse, quite relatable for me.
I love Japanese stories.

But I didn't enjoy it. Why?
Because it's too slow, like going nowhere.
The writing, maybe because of the translation, is too flat for my liking. I was expecting some vivid imagery and all that but, as I said, the writing seemed a bit dull (to me).
Strangely, couldn't connect with the protagonist.

Thank you for the review copy.

I'm genuinely sorry to say I didn't have the patience for this novel. I think it accurately portrays the inner life and outward circumstances of many Japanese women but for me it was too slow moving and the protagonist was too passive for me to develop an interest in her predicament. I wish I could say otherwise as I was a big fan of both Breasts & Eggs and Heaven. This novel is likely to appeal to readers who found those novels to visceral and disturbing. I have many reader friends who have read this ARC and raved about it and I can actually think of two friends I'd buy the novel for when it comes out, but it wasn't my kind of read.

*May contain small spoilers*

All the lovers in the night is a unique and engrossing character study of Fuyuko Irie, a thirty-something woman living in Tokyo.

Fuyuko has very little self identity, and constantly makes major life decisions based on fate or what other people suggest she should do. Her character was uniquely interesting. As a person, she lacks any strong depth of character and appears extremely reserved, to the point that she surrounds herself with people that excessively dominate the conversation. Her relationships with other characters clearly show an unfair power disadvantage on her behalf. She struggles to fit in to society and Kawakami’s study of the outsider character was perfect. This book would be perfect for fans of Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine, as Fuyoku’s character really reminded me of the protagonist of that story.

Throughout the first half of the book, Fuyuko is completely absorbed by her work as a copy writer and it almost seems like her life purpose. This reminded me of the first half of Convenience Store Woman by Sayaka Murata. But then, as she struggles to fit in, she begins heavily drinking. This part was hard to read and frustrating for the reader as you want better for the character. By fate, she runs into and starts a relationship with an older man who she regularly meets for coffee. This allows her to open up a bit more and he helps her come out of her shell a little. Unfortunately Fuyuko takes this attention and becomes almost obsessive of this man.

I was heartbroken for her, and really wanted more for the character throughout and to see her become more confident in herself. Unfortunately, through her lack of conviction, some people take advantage of her and hurt her.

“It pisses me off sometimes. Being around you” - the line that broke my crumbling heart for this character.

The focus of this novel is on the character, so the plot is definitely second fold. It’s not action packed my any means and rather slow paced (particularly at the beginning) but this is done artistically to represent Fuyuko’s mundane and repetitive life. She is lonely and anxious and the book exudes these emotions. Through the depth of Fuyuko’s character, Kawakami makes a social commentary on how unmarried thirty-something women are treated in Japan as an outsider. But this novel isn’t 100% serious, there are also several points that are rather unusual and absurd, such as some odd conversations and Fuyuko’s bizzare dreams.

Due to my intense interest in the character, I’d rate this one 5 stars. Definitely want to read more of Kawakami’s work to see how they compare.

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher Europa Editions for the eARC of this book in exchange for an honest review

Thank you to NetGalley and to Europa Editions for this eARC of Mieko Kawakami’s newest translation "All The Lovers in the Night!"

This was my first Kawakami, and I was really excited to finally read her because of Haruki Murakami's high praise of her writing. Once I started the book, I was able to see striking similarities in style between Kawakami and Murakami, both in the simplistic way the authors describe everyday occurrences in a way that still draws the reader in, in the relationships that develop between characters, and in the details that are brought up again and again (in this case, the narrator's obsession with the concept of light).

Kawakami seems to excel at writing about people on the margins, if this book is any reflection of her typical style. "All the Lovers in the Night" is an exploration of a woman who has just been shunted around from experience to experience, never making any decisions for herself or making much of an impression on anyone. Fuyuko Irie is a proofreader who almost never leaves her home (save for her annual walk around Tokyo on her birthday). When she leaves her job to go freelance, she finds herself with more time on her hands and starts venturing out into the world more. This book really touches on the fear of your life being insignificant, waking up and realizing you don't matter in the ways you want to. I also found the end really satisfying.

This was a great exploration of the mundane, and I really appreciated how rich the internal life of the narrator was. I'm already looking forward to my next Kawakami!

If you’ve been on my BookTok, it’s no secret how much I love Mieko Kawakami’s writing—I’m still emotionally recovering from Heaven and I plan on rereading Breasts and Eggs later this year (even though it’s been maybe nine months since I’ve read it). I was ecstatic when I got my hands on an ARC of her next book, All the Lovers in the Night (thanks Europa Editions and NetGalley!)

Our narrator, Fuyuko Irie leads a quiet life as a freelance copyeditor in a city where it is difficult to organically forge relationships—the only person she speaks to on a regular basis is her coworker, Hijiri. The only time she goes out at night is on Christmas Eve (her birthday) to look at light, one of the few things that brings Fuyuko beauty and solace.

One day, Fuyuko looks at the person in the mirror and does not recognize the depleted person she sees in the mirror. Determined to change, she forms a relationship with a man, a high school physics teacher who shares with Fuyuko a passion for light.

I at first was under the impression this book was going to be centered around romance, but while this relationship is important to the story, at the heart of it, All the Lovers in the Night is a book about self-discovery, the necessity of vulnerability, and unlikely friendships . I identified with Fuyuko’s guarded interiority and the undoing that comes with Fuyuko confronting a past and reconciling it with a present self.

All the Lovers in the Night has both a poetic and colloquial cadence. Kawakami’s writing is poetic, visceral yet tender. I found myself deeply moved by the recurrent image and threads of light throughout the book and how light is a thing that both reflects and gives form in darkness. I even have been finding myself increasingly writing about light in my poetry because of this book!

All the Lovers in the Night comes out on May 12, 2022—let me know how you like it when you get your hands on this beautiful book.

All The Lovers in the Night by Kawakami Mieko was an advance digital copy from the publisher and is my favourite Kawakami so far. Ms. Ice Sandwich I loved, Breasts and Eggs was great, Heaven was good but triggering for me, so I couldn’t enjoy it. All The Lovers in the Night was a writer firing on all cylinders. What is ostensibly a series of conversations is a beautiful portrayal of alcoholism and loneliness from the inside without any of the moralising or emotional manipulation that often comes with writing about this subject. Kawakami’s writing is deceptively simple and she uses that skill to great effect when dealing with issues such as this.

Thank you to NetGalley and to Europa Editions for this eARC.

Fuyuko Irie is a proofreader. She does not get on with her co-workers, who find her quite weird, and exclude her as a result, even bullying her a little. She has no social life at all, and when she interacts with other people, she finds herself tongue-tied, and awkard.

Her life changes when someone with whom she once worked, Kyoko, offers her an opportunity to freelance. Because she hates her workplace, she realises she has nothing to lose, and in fact can spend all her time in her apartment, limiting social interactions. She meets Hijiri, who works for the new publisher, and who is to send her galleys for proofreading. Hijiri is an extrovert, with a vibrant social life—the opposite of Fuyuko.

At first things go fine for Fuyuko, although she finds her new life lonely, apart from her interactions with Hijiri, which become more frequent and more social, sometimes happening in bars. Fuyuko does not drink at these meetings, but, seeing Hijiri drink, and feeling that she wants to be more like her—more uninhibited—Fuyuko starts to drink at home, and then starts to carry alcohol around in her tote.

In another effort to expand her life, Fuyuko decides to go to college, where she meets Mitsutsuka, an older man who says he’s a physics teacher, and who attends courses at the same college. They embark on a friendship that Fuyuko comes to depend on, and meet regularly at a cafe.

This is the basic plot of Kawakami’s story, with a great in-depth study of Fuyuko, why she is the way she is, and then her journey back to herself. There are long passages that are almost in stream-of-consciousness style, which started to make my eyes glaze over in parts—particularly when Hijiri was speaking, which was a lot. There is also a plot twist that I did not really see coming, at the end, which I’m still not completely sure I’m happy about. However, Fuyuko’s story arc, the core of the novel, is a wonderful, redemptive one.

In all, this took me longer to read than it should have, and maybe that’s because the pacing is slowed down by monologues. This is also my first Kawakami, and I’m encouraged to seek out the author’s other books.

Rated: 7/10.

Big thank you to @netgalley and @europaeditions for letting me read and review Meiko Kawakami’s newest translation ‘All The Lovers in the Night’ 🌙

ATLITN is about a mid-thirty year old freelance copy editor who lives in a city where she speaks to no one other than her editor and where her life revolves around her work and little else. When she decides she needs change, she processes a life altering occurrence from her youth and learns who she wants to be from now on and who she wants to surround herself with while doing so.

This was the first novel I read by Kawakami and I’m now very curious to read the other translated novels! The writing style reads both calmingly and easily while being entertaining as well. There are a lot of both king and short monologues where the characters process their emotions, thoughts and feelings which provide a refreshing insight into the human experience ✨

After a slow start I really enjoyed this one - the character grew on me and her choices were less confusing and more deliberate? Or at least relatable.

In the vein of Luster and Convenience Store Woman, Kawakami's latest novel to be translated into English (and done flawlessly by Sam Bett and David Boyd) examines a woman on the margins.

Fuyuko Irie is a 34 year old, antisocial freelance editor who spends all her time at home working on projects, fact-checking and searching for errors in manuscripts. The only pleasure she finds is her annual birthday walk, on Christmas Eve, when she goes out alone at night to look at the lights.

One day she sees her reflection while running an errand and discovers she's a bit unhappy with her life. Her attempts to make changes in her life lead her into conversations and new environments that cause her to question whose life plan she's following: her own or the one laid out for her by other people?

Kawakami is great at writing about the outsiders of society. In Heaven, which I recently read and loved, she captured that feeling of teenagers who don't fit in to almost a painful degree. Fuyuko, similarly, is one who lives on the outskirts of society and seems to have very little agency. But when she realizes her life is passing her by, she attempts to make something happen for herself.

I loved the atmosphere Kawakami created in this novel. The interiority of the character was richly drawn, and though she's not always the most likeable character or someone you'd want to be friends with, you can't help but sympathize with her. It truly makes you wonder how much of her life is the way it is because of her own choices or because of things done to her and decided for her.

Readers who like meandering, slice of life novels about depressed women in their 30s will love this. I enjoyed the journey though the ending didn't satisfy me as much. Nonetheless, Kawakami is a writer to watch and I'll continue to read whatever gets translated into English. Her nuanced look at life, particularly for those who don't fit in, is a refreshing perspective to read from in modern literature.

This was my first time reading Kawakami and she did not disappoint! I might've related too much to Fuyuko, as a lonely person spending most of her time alone, working in her apartment, but I think we can all relate to that feeling of isolation still. Her experiences were real, they were sad, and sometimes surprising. Every conversation she had with the other characters had a lot of meaning and brought up topics that made me think, like motherhood, sense of self, and even physics. I was worried towards the end that her story was going to wrap up too nicely, but I think it was actually quite balanced and realistic, if sad. I would definitely recommend this to anyone still reeling from pandemic isolation, and everyone I know who loves books about women just existing. Currently running to start Breasts and Eggs.

I felt that this book was an interesting read as it called into question the role of appearance and society's attachment to "looking good". I did find this book hard to get into and I think its predominately due to my mood-reading behaviours. And that has little to do with the prose as it is stunning more so on my own brain. If literary fiction is your main genre and you are not a mood reader like myself you will find this book easier and more enjoyable. I still liked it but I may have picked the wrong time.

This one is for all my folks who love books about girls doing nothing, living their lives, coming into themselves the hard way. This one flutters lightly onto the chest and leaves a cold trail. You feel half unraveled, uncomfortably loose. Neither here nor there, just like our narrator. There is a lot about the workplace that makes the reader think about passion and identity as tied up with our jobs. Who are we without our work? Are we remarkable? What if our work is simply to enhance other people's creativity - how do we bring meaning to the mundane act of uncreation, or everything being done with purpose, without regard for want or beauty? And what happens when we finally find our way to our cravings? What possibilities open up?

Somehow the book, page by page, felt like nothing was happening but I was swept along in its tidal wave of the quotidian. It's a treatise on how not to live yet how to love yourself even when you do just that. I can't wait to read more Kawakami after this!!

“i knew what was stuck in my head. a phrase… i took the pencil to the first blank page and wrote the words: ‘all the lovers in the night.’”

Over the last few months I've become completely obsessed with Mieko Kawakami’s writing. The way she writes about characters that live such mundane lives in such a short amount of pages will always leave me *screaming and crying* With ‘All the Lovers in the Night,’ we’re following Fuyuko Irie as she lives alone, working as a freelance editor and seems to never go out of her way to switch up her boring life. but out of nowhere, she realizes that there must be something more to her life than spending her days alone, doing only what’s expected of her and that’s when we see Fuyuko make some changes. She meets a new friend who’s the complete opposite of her, she meets a man that she can’t get out of her head and in the end, she might not have made any real changes to her life but she learns that it takes baby steps.

This book felt very different from other works by Kawakami, instead of reading through it at a rapid fire pace, I was taking my time with it. I would read only a few pages at a time, sit with what was going on in Fuyuko's life and then pick it back up the next day and I think that's exactly what made this so enjoyable to read. It's as if you're forced to sit with Kawakami's writing and see where you fit into the story, instead of reading this short book in one sitting and not getting much out of it. Every time I put this down, I kept thinking about it. I thought about Fuyuko’s loneliness. I thought about how atmospheric these scenes were. I even thought about where I'll end up in my thirties, will I be like Fuyuko or will I be someone else? Whether that was Kawakami's intention or not, I managed to laugh and cry along with Fuyuko's story while reflecting on my own life once I finished reading.

The plot is: a woman, alone, struggling.

I just adore Kawakami's writing. How soft and sharp it is, how particular and hazy, how generous and incisive. It's like a dream, but one that you've had before, and one that sticks to your ribs all day. I just love it. I wish, once again, that I knew every language.

"Whenever my emotions or whatever kick in, my world goes blank-like something's taken over me. Then I start doubting everything, like, what if my whole life was just a quote from something else, only I never realized it? That's where my brain goes."

"I mean, that feeling that none of this is mine like it's just something I picked up somewhere, sometimes I start to think that maybe even that's something I ripped off. I'm a real lost cause, I know."

Having a hard time trying to process my feelings with this one. while the book felt just alright to me, certain scenes did give me a lot to think about. It's a very quiet story, and by which I mean it's never particularly loud with what it has to say by letting the readers contemplate the message by themselves, which I appreciate a lot in my books. I've grown to appreciate our protagonist and her passive nature as the story went on. It felt deliberate; Fuyuko didn't know where or how to fit in and conform to any of society's expectations on women that she grew so detached from her own life. We see her struggle in trying to relate to other people. I liked how Kawakami showed the contrast between her life and her other two friends, Hijiri and Noriko. However, the romance, if you could call it that, really turned me off the whole book. I think I get what the author was trying to do but I just did not enjoy that aspect of the story. On the other hand, I like its exploration of loneliness and companionship. Overall it's a great book, you just have to read it in a certain mood so you can fully enjoy it.

The thing about an author's first translated novel being her best one is it sets the bar high for all her subsequent translated works, and they might not wholly live up to it.

Such is the case here with ALL THE LOVERS IN THE NIGHT, whose story of a thirty-something woman with a solitary job in Tokyo bears similarities to BREASTS AND EGGS, but - published in its original Japanese nearly a decade before the latter - is less successful in terms of story and emotional beats, though I still like it.

I enjoy the novel's exploration of its themes - the transient and obfuscating nature of time, memories, and acts of remembering and recollection - and the gradual growth of the protagonist Irie. However, I can hardly remember the story - what takes place between the crucial scenes and plot points - for it seems static a lot of the time, with similar occurrings replaying in several loops.

There is nothing wrong with a novel that does not focus on plot, but what substitutes for that - be it inner monologue, rumination, characterization - should be effective, and in this case I do not find Irie's reflections to be effective enough. The book also needs more proofreading and copyediting, as there are still some missing words and grammatical errors.

Nevertheless, I do enjoy watching the character grow as she tentatively learns to bask in the night and, step by step, revel in all its lights.

I find this book so intriguing. Compared to many books that I’ve read, nothing much happens in this one, yet I find myself wanting to continue flipping the page.

There’s something interesting about the mundane, every day life of a person, where nothing happens but you follow them through their day, their thoughts, their past...and suddenly you’re halfway through the book. Kawakami’s writing is addictive, and I can’t put a finger on why. Maybe it’s how the main characters are flawed, have a million thoughts in their heads, live a rather uneventful life unlike what we see on TV. They are relatable, that’s why I want to read more.

All the lovers in the Night follows Fuyuko Irie, a freelance copy editor in her mid-30s, living alone with barely any social interactions on a daily basis. She could leave her phone uncharged for days, barely leave her house except to the convenience store and library, and not have any visitors. Prior to this, I had no clue what a copy editor does, and I’m glad this book describes it in a rather realistic way instead of through the rose-tinted version I had in my mind. While not much really happens, a part of the book shows the contrast in the lives of Fuyuko and her 2 of her friends of the same age, Hijiri and Noriko. In the mid 30s, one is alone, one has an active social life, and the other, in an unfulfilled marriage and with children.

I've finished this book in 4 days, felt a range of emotions such as secondhand embarrassment, awkwardness, happiness, and cried and cried so much. It's definitely a type of book that I've not read before, and am excited to read more like this.

Mieko Kawakami examines the inner life of the modern Japanese woman again in this book. After reading Breasts and Eggs, I was excited by the prospect of yet another novel deftly processing the pressures and concerns surrounding women. Though at times I felt frustrated and disheartened by our passive narrator who seemed to live in her life rather than live herself, as the story progressed I could not help but continue to root for her against all odds.

Kawakami uses all her women characters to express the deep dissatisfaction that colors their life no matter what decisions they’ve made in it. The narrator, who appears to have made no decisions and floats in the world not of her own making, expresses the same dissatisfaction at times and shows it in other myriad and mundane ways as Kawakami describes the small details of her day. It’s in the accumulation of the details that this story progresses, more so than the bursts of didactic explanation from women about their view of life or their situations. Here, sometimes it’s not in what is said and acknowledged out loud, but the deeper truth that takes into account personal trauma, hope, and resilience. Overall, this book ended up touching me even though I felt very negatively about it halfway through when I thought I couldn’t take more of the narrator’s almost apathetic self destruction.

Many thanks to Europa Editions for the ARC through NetGalley!