It’s always nice to have the mystery solved at the end of a story but when the story is so short the several pages of explaining felt tedious. While it had quite a brilliant twist the ending sort of over-explains itself. This particular copy included a short story by the author titled “Yuko”. Satsuki knows things she shouldn’t and the narration is too peaceful for someone who was just murdered. First person omniscient is rarely satisfying, and it isn’t in this case either. It’s clear that first person was the more powerful choice for this story but it wasn’t executed well. Satsuki continues to narrate ignoring that her corpse isn’t present, and as soon as it is again she goes back to being attached to it. She still feels what her corpse feels and sees what it sees but often the protagonists aren’t anywhere near her corpse. Satsuki is telling the story, and it’s made clear that she’s attached to her corpse. The biggest issue I took with this book was the narration.

Otsuichi did a good job and weaving all the characters together and foreshadowing, but the story just felt a little empty.

There’s very little sadness or anger, and the ending was a little too neat and tidy. It lacks a lot of the emotion and horror a story like this should have. The story itself obviously did have the potential to be thrilling, but overall was unsatisfying. No matter how big it was in Japan the English translation is going to happen upon mostly new readers and this introduction will ruin the thrill for them. Perhaps this is fine when writing introductions for classics such as Charlotte’s Web where most of the English speaking world knows the ending but not for a story like this. It had the potential to be quite a suspenseful tale, but the introduction tells us how everything unfolds. The introduction sort of spoils most of the story, which is a shame. I received this book for free from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. Now she can see again, astonishingly what she sees out of her new left eye is the experiences and memories of its previous owner. While her youthful killers try to hide her body, she tells us the story-from the point of view of her dead body-of the childrens' attempt to get away with murder.īlack Fairy Tale is classic J-horror: a young girl loses an eye in an accident, but receives a transplant.

Summer is a simple story of a nine-year-old girl who dies while on summer vacation. Two short novels, including the title story and Black Fairy Tale, plus a bonus short story. Published by Haikasoru on September 21, 2010 Summer, Fireworks, and My Corpse by Otsuichi, Nathan Collins

Black fairy tale otsuichi