What a delightfully, slightly weird yet totally captivating story. Butter is the type of story you get hooked on and just can’t put down.

‘There are two things I can simply not tolerate: feminists and margarine’

Manako Kajii is a self confessed foodie who has been convicted of the serial murders of lonely businessmen. She seemingly seduced this affluent men with her delicious home cooking. With the case gaining a large following the public want to know more, but Kajii refuses to see or speak to anyone.
That is until Rika Machida writes a letter asking for her recipe for beef stew, Kajii can’t resist writing back.

Rika is a 30 something journalist working in a male dominated workplace. Excited to be allowed into Kajii’s world Rika throws herself all in. Although the visits closer resemble a foodie critique than journalistic research.
The more Rika learns about food and cooking the more she finds something lighting up within her.
Maybe Rika isn’t that dissimilar to Kajii…

Inspired by the true story of the "The Konkatsu Killer". Asako Yuzuki’s Butter is a deliciously enjoyable story that at times will leave you almost salivating over the foodie descriptions. I’m sure at times I could almost taste the butter or many other Japanese dishes.

Butter is truly brilliant and vivid and compelling story that Asako has bought to life. The story also touches on subjects such as loneliness, obsession and compulsion, misogyny and ‘a women’s place in the world’. and keeps you guessing throughout the book. I found it to be a fascinating and thought provoking story that kept my interest from start to finish.

(I will be posting this review on the 24th February to my blog, Instagram and Goodreads accounts, links below)

It took me nearly a week to read Butter. This was partly due to the fact I was suffering from eye strain and tiredness at the time and couldn't read as much as usual and partly due because the prose was quite densely packed on the page, making it hard to skim/speed read. It is not, however, a reflection on the book itself which was well written, interesting and enjoyable. The story explored many interesting themes, and it did so in a way that kept you guessing as you tried to unravel truth from lies. It held my interest from start to finish and was thought-provoking throughout. I would definitely be keen to read other works by this author and I am giving this book 4.5 stars.

(My review will go live on my blog, Goodreads and Instagram on 26 Feb 2024 at the links provided below.)