- Published: 04/04/2024
- ISBN: 9781803510606
- Granta Books
- 96 pages
The Hole
Hiroko Oyamada
Translated by David Boyd
When Asa’s husband is offered a new job away from the city, the couple end up relocating. And since his new office is very close to his family’s home, it makes sense to move in next door to his parents.
Through the long hot summer, Asa does her best to adjust to their new rural lives, to the constant presence of her in-laws, to the emptiness of her existence and the incessant buzz of cicadas. And then one day, while running an errand for her mother-in-law, she comes across a strange creature, follows it to the embankment of a river, and ends up falling into a hole – a hole that seems to have been made specifically for her.
Thus begins a series of bizarre experiences that drive Asa deeper into the mysteries of this rural landscape and the family she has married in to, leading her to question her role in this world and, eventually, who she even is.
£12.99
A great book
Patti Smith
Surreal and mesmerizing
New York Times
A haunting and transformative work of fiction
Laura van den Berg
From the Same Author
Hiroko Oyamada on Granta.com
Fiction | The Online Edition
The Hole
Hiroko Oyamada
‘The hole felt as though it was exactly my size – a trap made just for me.’
Fiction | The Online Edition
Careless
Hiroko Oyamada
‘As I lay on the mattress, the white toe pads of the gecko floated up before me, against the vastness of the blue-black night. Rather than a presence, it seemed to me more like a trace, a barely discernible odour that flooded in on the air.’
Fiction | Granta 127
Spider Lilies
Hiroko Oyamada
‘The breeze smelled of many things: autumn and earth, the green of the countryside, face powder and old age.’