Product Description

Mary, a blond graduate from England, has drifted into a job in a hostess lounge in Osaka. She is employed by the enigmatic Mama-san to spend her evenings flirting with rich Japanese salarymen, playing drinking games and taking turns in the karaoke booth. Mary is in love with Yuji, Mama-san's handsome son. But Yuji's loyalty is to the petty Yakuza gangster for whom he works. Watanabe, the introverted cook, watches Mary from the kitchen. He exists in his own manga-fuelled fantasy of the fourth dimension, and believes he can see into other people's souls. When he perceives the danger of Mary's growing obsession with Yuji, he resolves to protect her whatever the cost. Mr Sato works for the Daiwa Trading Corporation. Obsessive overwork cannot cure the emptiness of his solitary life. Lured against his will to the Sayonara Bar by his boss, he finds himself returning there to escape his dead wife's ghost.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #607666 in Books
• Published on: 2006-01-02
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 329 pages

Review
'With dry humour and crisp observation, Barker conveys the inner chaos masked by the external regimens of a society where intimacy is contrived, and loyalty is strained. Japan has not, for a long time, been made to seem so accessible, or so remote' - Literary Review. 'A stunningly eclectic debut. Original, often perplexing, always intriguing, Sayonara Bar is a showpiece of breathtaking new talent' - Daily Record. 'New author Susan Barker has set her edgy, sly debut in a hostess lounge' - Elle. 'A fluid style and writes sentences reminiscent of Haruki Murakami...Barker's descriptions are spot on' - JapanVisitor.com.

Scottish Daily Record
'Sayonara Bar is a showpiece of breathtaking new talent.'

Rebecca Pearson, Independent on Sunday, Books of the Year.
'A beautifully written and far-reaching exploration of Japanese culture from first-time novelist Susan Barker.'

Customer Reviews

Sayonara bar - a review
This was a quirky and quite engrossing read with three separate but eventually intertwining stories centred around the Sayonara bar.Each story had an existential element to it which certainly added to the off-beat nature of the whole novel.The only problem for me was that all the unusual events and sinister happenings didn't really pay off with a satisfying ending.The three stories failed to live up to their early potential and finished with a wimper rather than a bang which,for me,lost a deserved fourth star.There was much to enjoy though as the prose was interesting and quite quirky in itself, the characters were well developed and rounded and there was rarely a dull moment.
All in all an enjoyable but flawed debut.

Terrific Book
This is the best piece of popular fiction I have read in a very long time. The fact that it is a first novel is incredible given the competence and scope of the writing. This young lady has a terrific career ahead if she can maintain this standard of work. And I'm sure she shall.

Sayonara Bar
The intertwining of the characters' stories in this novel is definitely its strength, but even the slight alteration of narrative style and tone with each section of the story cannot keep the reader's attention throughout. By far the most intriguing character is Sato, who is carefully drawn, but there is something very dense about the prose in general which makes it hard to take at times. If you persevere, the plot is interesting, but lacks the slick presentation that would confirm its status as a truly impressive piece.