Blizzardboy | A Kiwi in Australia

I picked up a copy of Randy Taguchi’s Outlet last weekend from the Tsukuba Public Library. I was initially attracted to the fresh cover design by Chip Kidd – . I hadn’t heard of Randy Taguchi before I picked up this book. A little bit of poking around and on the back flap I learned that she started out as a blogger, and was picked up from there and offered a contract to write for Gentosha, a Tokyo publishing house. Outlet was first published by Gentosha, in Japanese, in 2000.

Overall I really enjoyed Outlet. The writing style reminded me a great deal of a number of Japanese authors, such as Haruki Murakami. There is a certain smoothness, and lightness, that Italo Calvino would approve of to be found in the works of a number of contemporary Japanese authors. The plot is to the fore, and being a plot driven work it is highly readable.

The story is based around the character of Yuki Asakura, a Tokyo based financial journalist, and her experiences as a result of the death of her younger brother. As a university student Asakura studied psychology and this provides on of the tropes that the story revolves around – rational “scientific” analysis as opposed to more traditional occult or shamanistic approaches to the psyche.

Sanford May in his review of Outlet explores the sexual aspects in some detail. There is a lot of sex in this novel but it is conveyed in a subtle way which doesn’t distract from the development of the story.

The outlet that the title refers to is a clever little wordplay on the meanings of power plug and energy release. In Japanese outlet is consento, although the final o is not sounded, making it sound a lot like the English consent. There are overtones of Timothy Leary to be found in Outlet. She was turned on is a way by the death of her brother, the rest of the novel details how she tunes in – often this is in direct conflict with traditional models of psychoanalysis, and finally drops out of the social milieu she was once part of.

Well worth a read.