This is Amiko, Do You Copy? - Natsuko Imamura

This is Amiko, Do You Copy? by Natsuko Imamura, translated by Hitomi Yoshio / ISBN 9781782279792 / 122-page paperback published in 2023 by Pushkin Press, from their new Japanese Novellas series

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A surprising and moving novella about a misunderstood neurodivergent girl from one of Japan's most acclaimed young writers, the author of The Woman in the Purple Skirt

Other people don’t seem to understand Amiko. Whether eating curry rice with her hands at school or peeking through the sliding doors at her mother’s calligraphy class, her curious, exuberant nature mostly meets with confusion.

When her mother falls into a depression and her brother begins spending all his time with a motorcycle gang, Amiko is left increasingly alone to navigate a world where she doesn’t quite fit.

Subtle, tender and moving, This is Amiko shows us life through the eyes of a unique, irrepressible, neurodivergent young character.

Natsuko Imamura was born in Hiroshima Prefecture. She has won the Osamu Dazai Prize, the Yukio Mishima Prize and the Akutagawa Prize for her fiction, which in addition to This is Amiko includes The Woman in the Purple Skirt. She lives in Osaka with her husband and daughter.