Outlet

The word "outlet" has lots of definitions. "An opening or vent permitting escape or release" for example, or "a means for release or expression of emotion, creative energy, etc." You can have an electrical outlet, an outlet for your frustrations, a sexual outlet, an outlet mall...the list goes on. The multifaceted meanings of the title of Randy Taguchi's "Outlet" are a clue to the multilayered story within its pages. Following Yuki Asakura after the strange, unexplained death of her brother, the novel twists and turns through deeper layers of Yuki's psyche as she tries to figure out what happened to Taka and why she doesn't seem to care more about it. Yuki's sexual appetite, her sudden ability to smell death in the air, her magnetic appeal to almost everyone she's known, her history with her former teacher/therapist/lover as well as her current lovers all add extra pieces to the puzzle of Taka's death. He died lying down - he just seemed to run out of energy, after plugging a vacuum cleaner into an electrical outlet. Yuki seems to give and receive a charge from her multiple lovers. How does it all come together? Surreal and unexpected and strangely distant, "Outlet" is a story about death, ghosts, strange odors, sex, shamanism, memories, and the connections that form between people. It definitely got to me in unexpected ways - an impressive surprise!

Randy Taguchi, Outlet (Vertical, 2000) Electricity is one of the main concerns of the modern world, whether one is generating it, using it, trying to conserve it, or what have you. It's rather odd, then, that I've never encountered a novel that uses electricity as such a central motif as Outlet, Randy Taguchi's flawed, yet compelling, first novel. Flawed because it's got some typical first-novel problems. Compelling because, well, it's compelling. I'll explain that bit later. The novel opens with the death of Taka Asakura, who we initially perceive as a no-good roustabout through the eyes of his similarly no-good father and his sister, Yuki, a financial writer with a secret--she's also a sex addict. Taka's death was somewhat mysterious; he simply wasted away, and Yuki wants to find out what brought him to the point where he simply couldn't be bothered to live anymore. As she gets closer to understanding what it was that drove Taka to suicide, Yuki, forced into contact with people from her past, must also confront her own demons. Much of what the novel lacks is in its pacing, which is a pretty common malady among first novels; Taguchi got famous as a blogger, and oftentimes the novel feels like a series of blog entries, but with plot and characters. The pacing problems get better as the novel goes along, though, and Taguchi gets past the setup stage and into the real meat of the novel--Yuki's own problems and the measures to which she must go to solve them. There are a few overly convenient bits involved in this to get us farther along, but nothing unforgivable or too overt. On the other hand, these characters are well worth getting to know. Yuki is an exceptionally well-developed character, and those she comes into contact with multiple times through the novel are also well-drawn and complex. The mysteries she tries to unravel have less to do with the things you'd find in conventional mysteries; this is a psychological novel more than it is a mystery, and the puzzles she has to solve are more of the emotional variety. I suspect that those who can identify with Yuki's (or Taka's) neuroses will find this book much more fulfilling than those who don't. Is that you? Take a chance on this one and find out. *** ½

When I bought this book, I expected to be entertained by another good Japanese tale of ghosts and spirits. However Outlet is much more than that. Yuki, the main character is a young woman who lives her life and sexuality as a man: she is emotionally detached and is not shy about living a full sex life.She comes from a very dysfunctional family, her father is a drunk, her mother is abused and her brother is just plain strange.The latter dies of self starvation, and when Yuki visits his appartment she smells the smell of death.She also sees his ghost, but that ghost is there to give her amazing revelations concerning her own nature. This is an interesting and entertaining book, even for skeptic readers like me .

Randy Taguchi's debut novel opens with the protagonist, Yuki Asakura, waking up after a night of lovemaking with an acquaintance, a photographer named Kimura. Like all of the other men who have slept with her, and there are many, Kimura is a bit obsessed with Yuki, but she does not return his affection. As normal for her, after she has sex, she loses interest in men. With Kimura still in bed, Yuki clicks on her laptop and reads the stocks. As a freelance finance writer, the stock market is the one thing, well, maybe booze, also, that truly interests Yuki. Its movements and its total lack of emotion and the way its glacial indifference affects the world enthrall her. After her sleep-muddled head clears, Yuki leaves the love hotel. While walking upon some train tracks she spots her brother Taka and his dog Shiro, but how can this be? Her father, in a drunken rage, beat the dog to death years before. When she calls out to her brother, he disappears. After she returns home, Yuki receives a phone call from her parents informing her that her brother is dead. Spooked that she might have seen her brother's ghost, Yuki learns of the horrific way in which her brother died. After renting a new apartment, apparently Taka lost the will to live. Resting upon a quilt that covered a tiled floor, Taka allowed himself to starve to death and because his family had lost contact with him, his body was not discovered until it had decomposed. The stench of the gelatinous puddle of rotting blood and maggots had permeated the entire apartment building. Being that her parents were in no condition to take care of more mundane matters, Yuki saw to it that her brother's possessions were taken care of and she made amends with the owner of the apartment building. However, while inside the apartment Yuki is overwhelmed by the stench of rot and afterwards she is able to detect the slightest trace of rot and death. She becomes so adept in fact that she can tell when someone is sick. However, this is only the beginning. Yuki is haunted by her brother in her dreams and eventually seeks the help of her old college advisor, a psychologist with whom she had shared a twisted relationship with years before. Wanting to discover why her brother died and why he was obsessed with outlets, Yuki journeys into the depths of her own mind and as she peels back the layers of her subconscious, she reveals the dark putrescence of her own past. A past she has to come to terms with herself in order to understand not only why her brother died, but to prevent herself from following his dark path. Famous for her online diary in Japan, Taguchi is one of a number of female writers who have entered Japan's literary scene in the last decade. While not quite as explicit as Sakurai Ami or Kanehara Hitomi, Taguchi is still quite graphic, but unlike the former, Taguchi seems to have more to offer the world of letters than shock value. Another value the novel possesses is that it gives the reader a glimpse

Many years ago, a friend and I came up with a word game in which we replaced natural references with manmade ones. Instead of saying, "She had eyes the color of robins' eggs," we'd say, "Her eyes were IBM blue." "The late afternoon sky was airbrushed with the red of Chinese lacquer." Over time, history, that is, our reference points do change. From a different perspective, we may wonder if it's the same world as that we have been looking at. From the start of Randy Taguchi's "Outlet," there is a sense that something is off-kilter, and that feeling keeps you on edge throughout the book. The events the main character encounters--the odd death of her brother (he seemed to have let himself die although he had no illness), a search for meaning in mourning, a dysfunctional family, and sexual relations bare of relations, are common themes in life and novels, but there is always the feeling that there is more to what is being described, that there is an approach to viewing the same events we can only feel a little but can't yet turn the corner to see fully. These are the same nagging sensations the main character experiences. And they lead her to question her own sanity. Why can she now smell the scent of death? Her dead brother is appearing to her, and seeming to appeal to her to discover the cause of his death. As a 21st century young woman who writes for an online financial publication, she is not looking for answers in religion and tradition, not even the new tradition of psychiatry. She sleeps with men without needing to fall for them. She would rather talk stocks and bonds than emotions. But she can't figure out what's going on and heads toward a nervous breakdown. So what of it? Is breaking down the end?The fears, toughness, dissolution of the main character are conveyed extremely well in the contemporary conversational tone of the narrative, translated beautifully from Japanese and without any accent. (Great job, Vertical!) It's an up-to-date sound, without the plummy "English" notes and wordiness still associated with "Literature." In this case, given the main character's profession, the first-person narrative is true to her character and the style of good magazine and business writing in the 21st century. While sounding spontaneous and almost casual, the narrative is smartly structured, as you will see when you get to the surprise ending, which although a surprise is not a cheat, because you sensed from the start that you were onto something fresh, with new reference points to view what you thought was a familiar world.