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  • Published: 1 April 2008
  • ISBN: 9780099515982
  • Imprint: Vintage
  • Format: Paperback
  • Pages: 224
  • RRP: $39.99

Autofiction



A Japanese Skins, revealing the dark, dangerous and drink-fuelled underbelly of teenage life. This is the sensational follow up to the award winning Snakes and Earrings: a compelling and often disturbing novel by a startlingly original Japanese author

Rin is flying back from her honeymoon. She's madly in love with her husband, Shin, and the future looks rosy. Then Shin disappears to the bathroom while he thinks Rin is sleeping and she starts to imagine that he has gone to seduce the flight attendant. As her thoughts spiral out of control the phrase 'madly in love' takes on a more sinister meaning.

Prizewinning author Hitomi Kanehara's sensational novel, Autofiction, follows Rin's life backwards through time from this moment so that we see her when she is eighteen, sixteen and finally fifteen, and a picture of the dark heart and violent past of this disturbed young woman gradually develops.

  • Published: 1 April 2008
  • ISBN: 9780099515982
  • Imprint: Vintage
  • Format: Paperback
  • Pages: 224
  • RRP: $39.99

About the author

Hitomi Kanehara

Hitomi Kanehara is the author of Snakes and Earrings which won the top Japanese literary award, the Akutagawa Prize. One of the judges, celebrated writer Ryu Murakami, said her book was 'easily the top choice, receiving the highest marks of any work since I became a member of the selection panel'. The Japanese edition of Snakes and Earrings has since topped bestseller lists and sold over a million copies.

Praise for Autofiction

Kanehara is an instant star

International Herald Tribune

Kanehara is a new voice who owes nothing to anyone and reinvents the novel afresh

Matt Thorne

Kanehara is the real thing. Her prose is lean, and her characterisation convincing

Independent

Hitomi Kanehara has a confidence in her writing that belies her years...Autofiction is a harsh but touching tale, and it is utterly impossible to put down - there's no escaping the fact that, even in translation, Kanehara's gritty and honest prose will get under your skin

The Skinny

Hitomi Kanehara is one of international fiction's most startling new voices... her anatomisation of a disturbed mind renders every description unique... this autofiction is the most elegant postmodern escape act by a contemporary novelist yet

Independent