Yukiko Motoya, The Lonesome Bodybuilder. Trans. Asa Yoneda. Soft Skull Press, 2018. 224pp. Link.
Source: borrowed from San Diego County Library, Poway branch

There are many droll conceits: a neglected housewife who takes up boxing and feels shame that she can’t stop a dog from biting her co-worker; a retail worker helping a woman in a fitting room who stays overnight; a man who falls in love with a girl leading an “evil gang” and feels betrayed when she seduces her own father; a boorish husband whose secret desire is to become a mountain peony. The conceits and the stories do not all work, but does that even matter when they are all so enchanting, wild, stylish?