The Cat and The City: 'Vibrant and accomplished' David Mitchell

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His life and his stories have a direct impact on so many of our characters here. His one son is an early protagonist in the book: a man who found his own success, but who has since fallen on hard times. The Cat and The City is a love letter to Japan and its literature. Bradley's passion for everything from onigiri to Tanizaki's short stories is woven into this book. Bradley was for a time an ex-pat and his insight into their perching state is particularly intriguing. He is also very clearly a man with a great tenderness for cats."—Rowan Hisayo Buchanan, author, Harmless Like You Some of the best stories in the collection are from expatriate perspectives. In Chinese Characters, a lonely young American woman called Flo secretly labours on an English translation of Nishi Furuni, a cat-obsessed writer whose works tie several characters together. A thrilling debut novel set on the streets of Tokyo. The Cat and City is a collection of inter-linking stories following different character across the Japanese capital. What connects them is a calico cat slinking its way through the city and into the character’s lives. I'm up for shitty unlikeable characters - but they have to have some sort of purpose and actually be well-written. this is just *not it* chief. there's just too much seedy characters and "implied messages" that are so condescending for me NOT to suspect the author bleeding into the characters.

Career woman Mari basically supports her English boyfriend, George, who teaches, takes photographs, and tries to be a good foreigner. They have a dysfunctional relationship. Mari wants to marry George but their fantasies of each other do not bear out the realities.

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interesting variations of medium in some chapters: comic strips, "translated novels" (after you disregard the ironic meta-ness), online posts (after you get through the shit character), poems etc. You can’t help but wonder how these threads will tangle; how these characters are about to alter one another’s narratives (most of all, the titular calico cat). There is a lot of talk of the upcoming 2020 Olympics and the preparations being made across the city (I am not an expert on Japan, but I imagine this is where the “slyly political” blurb comment comes from, at least in part, as the city goes about “clearing up” by taking people off the streets). There are several mentions of people doing their best not to stand out (because the nail that stands out gets hammered). There is a portrait of Tokyo which feels very atmospheric, although I have never been there so I have no way to know if it is accurate.

This city is too big, too many people, too much craziness going on that goes unnoticed or ignored.” I’ve lived in Japan for five years so I’m familiar with the tropes and archetypes he talks about from my first year (including the ‘chikan’ train molesters, although I always found England more dangerous personally). After that I developed friendships and relationships with people who are unrecognizable in any of these characters. I don’t ask for another romanticized view of the East but I also don’t see any of the goodness, kindness and complexity in the culture that I’ve experienced. I absolutely loved this book and can't believe it's a debut. There are lots of intertwining stories that are connected in clever – sometimes subtle, sometimes clearer – ways that go beyond the cat. I found myself completely immersed in each and every story, despite their short length, but the disappointment of moving on to another story was short-lived as I was immediately drawn into the next. There wasn't one weak story, which can be rare for this type of book! What’s more, each story explores various aspects of human nature and shares critiques on Japan’s modern society. Bradley covers an extensive list of cultural nuances: capsule hotels, video games, rush hour at busy Shinjuku station, and the cherry blossom trees, tinged with the palest pink. As someone who longs to visit Japan, I felt completely immersed in its culture, this book being a tangible evocation of Tokyo’s sights and sounds. That’s all to say, The Cat and the City is a charming book with a wistful air that is perfect for anyone who wants to armchair travel to Japan and take a tour around its most popular metropolis The content came across to me very much as western ideas in pretty Japanese oil-paper dressing - pure kitsch. Nothing like David Mitchell's "The Thousand Autums of Jacob de Zoet" or Ruth Ozeki's "For the Time Being", each of which is rightly literature, and in its own way are western confrontations with the other that is Japan.This might have been a series of stories, but the way they interlinked and wrapped around each other really does build a rewarding whole. Each character had their own unique voice, the stories meandered like a smooth rippling river and the city of Tokyo sparkled under the pen of the author. So, you can tell how much this book got to me! Murakami-esque and whimsical; Bradley's short story collection, in which characters reappear and plotlines come together thematically, is an ode to both Japan and cats. I loved this. A collection of (at first glance) stand-alone short stories. But incredibly cleverly woven together using a calico cat as a golden thread. Each story is a gem of description of the city of Tokyo, the Japanese culture and language. But at their heart, they are stories of families: close, estranged, new or old to which we can all relate. Not only that, each story is written in the style of the person who happens to be relating that tale. An elderly person, a child, a yakusa, or a poet, and all totally believable. You don’t have to be a lover of cats to read and enjoy it, you just need to be a lover of stories, and open to the magical world of a vibrant city and its inhabitants.” About the author But the city is changing. As it does, it pushes her to the margins where she chances upon a series of apparent strangers - from a homeless man squatting in an abandoned hotel, to a shut-in hermit afraid to leave his house, to a convenience store worker searching for love. The cat orbits Tokyo's denizens, drawing them ever closer.

Bradley cleverly employs the mysterious calico cat and his remerging characters as threads to weave multiple stories together. Be it a relative, a work colleague, a fleeting shared glance, or an overheard conversation, for me, part of the pleasure of this book was recognising the subtle connections between characters, connected even amid the hustle and bustle of the megacity.⁣ Those beautiful green eyes, what had they seen…Imagine all the secrets and lies it had been privy to, the things that humans get up to when they think no one is looking.”His other son is an honest working man whose job allows him to thread himself between so many of these other stories. Meanwhile, Furuni’s sci-fi stories help to create narratives and events for other characters, such as my personal favourite character in The Cat and the City: Flo. I couldn't help but think repeatedly of the phrase "six degrees of separation" while reading this. How whether through fate or intention, we each have such an impact on other people's lives.