Product Description

In the Tokyo suburbs four women work the draining graveyard shift at a boxed-lunch factory. Burdened with chores and heavy debts and isolated from husbands and children, they all secretly dream of a way out of their dead-end lives. A young mother among them finally cracks and strangles her philandering, gambling husband then confesses her crime to Masako, the closest of her colleagues. For reasons of her own, Masako agrees to assist her friend and seeks the help of the other co-workers to dismember and dispose of the body. The body parts are discovered, the police start asking questions, but the women have far more dangerous enemies -a yakuza connected loan shark who discovers their secret and has a business proposition, and a ruthless nightclub owner the police are convinced is guilty of the murder. He has lost everything as a result of their crime and he is out for revenge. OUT is a psychologically taut and unflinching foray into the darkest recesses of the human soul, an unsettling reminder that the desperate desire for freedom can make the most ordinary person do the unimaginable. REAL WORLD: New Natsuo Kirino coming out in September 2008

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #3833 in Books
• Published on: 2004-09-02
• Original language: Japanese
• Binding: Paperback
• 388 pages

Review
Out is a terrifying delve into the human psyche and the hidden darkness that lies within. It takes you to the edge of the psychological border and then grabs you and throws you over. Four women work the same mundane graveyard shift at a boxed-lunch factory in downtown Tokyo. Sick of heavy debts, household chores and family problems, they all dream of a life away from it all. A young mother finally snaps and murders her gambling husband. Mosako and her co-workers agree to dismember and dispose of the body for her. However, they soon have more to fear than the police asking awkward questions. A ruthless nightclub owner has been falsely accused of the murder and he is out for revenge. Natsuo Kirino blends a lethal cocktail of feminism, desperation and bloody murder. She will leave you shaken to the bone and feeling like you've just survived an earthquake. (Kirkus UK)

New York Times Book Review
'OUT is a potent cocktail of urban blight, perverse feminism and vigilante justice.'

USA today
'No gritty urban American tale of violence can match the horror of OUT.'

Customer Reviews

Breathtakingly horrible!
Set in a bleak urban landscape peopled by loansharks and yakuza, deranged men, and lonely, impoverished women, this novel - short on description and full of desperation, greed and hatred - had to be persuasive and brilliantly written to stand a chance. And I just loved it. It utterly gripped me, from start to finish. It's the product of a sharp intelligence, and bitterness fuelled by the lot of Japanese women. Cleverly plotted, it manages with ease the complex web of interconnections between the characters, and the almost-incredible story did convince me. (Although now and again I had to sit back and laugh at the daring of it: what would Masako's 17-year-old son have thought if he came home early to find his mother cutting up a corpse in the bathroom? Yes: the flashes of humour are very black indeed, but they do help to ease the sense of horror.)

For such a dark and disturbing novel, it's very accessible, and credit is due to the translator, who did an astonishingly good job. It reads throughout like an original text - the mark of an expert. In Kirino's writing, nothing is ever wasted or superfluous, and she's good at cranking up the tension. The final third is as suspenseful as anything I've ever read, and the climax is electrifying, and about as unclichéd as you can get. To say this is a psychologically powerful novel is a bit of an understatement. I've never read anything quite like it. I have a feeling, though, that it's one of those rare masterpieces that is best read just once. Not for the faint-hearted, or those who cannot imagine finding a plot centred on human dismemberment remotely enjoyable!

Out
Out is a really good read. I picked it up on a special offer and didn't get around to reading it for quite a while, but once I did I was hooked. Natsuo Kirino has a real knack for making you turn the page. I'd be interested to see more books by this author.

Good read, disappointing ending
If you enjoy japanese fiction or crime novels you'll enjoy this. It has a very good plot and good characters. Don't be put off by the names, you get used to them surprisingly quickly. I enjoyed the book thoroughly, but thought the ending was a bit weak.