Ryu Murakami's In The Miso Soup is a little weird. After mozying on by what appears to be a strangely seductive yet obviously comprised sex worker on the front cover, I didn't quite know what to expect. Frankly, when I asked my fiancee one time to grab this book out of my room for me, I don't think she knew what to expect either. No, I was not reading about beautiful sexy girls in Japan (not that there's anything wrong with that) for the last couple days.
Ryu took me way beyond the shallow sensationalism which so often defines (and limits) horror/thriller novels into an upside down world where the line between good and evil is totally vague. He builds heroes in the grime and rips up bastards who climb down into it from above. He bares his confusion about Japanese and American culture, modern lifestyles, and our collective path toward the future. In The Miso Soup asks us: "what the hell is going on here?", and pushes us to consider the gruesome, dead parts of our own lives. Its a little weird.
The plot follows Japanese nightlife guide Kenji as he leads self proclaimed "sex-superman" Frank, an American tourist, through the underbelly of Tokyo's Kabuki-cho red light district. While the beginning of Miso Soup is fairly linear and story driven, Kenji's internal commentary gradually becomes more prominent as he reflects on what an utter weirdo his client turns out to be.
Frank is real weird. He barely sips liquor one night, then guzzles it the next. He talks about stuff like sticking a needle into a baby's eye and sexually assaulting the homeless. He pays his tab with apparently blood-stained money. Where Ryu really shines in making Frank seem totally alien, however, is in his physicality. In contrast to Kenji, Frank is a non-descript gaijin with artificial looking skin, disheveled clothing and, as it is revealed in a sex club scene, a malformed penis. I really gotta say, I was kind of uncertain where the story was going when I came to that part.
I thought this was all going to serve to build Frank up into the "faceless hulking mass" movie monster, and without Ryu's sensitive heart the story probably could've gone on to be that way. It is precisely because of this sensitivity that the story became so touching. As Frank and Kenji trapeze neon-lit Tokyo streets, Miso Soup becomes a story about Kenji's confrontation with the reality of modern Japanese society and it's relationship to the outside world. Kenji grows increasingly suspicious of Frank, as the American's unnerving behaviors begin to identify with an active mass murderer. When Frank finally snaps at the pinnacle moment of the narrative (a slasher-fantasy killing spree in a karaoke club), the story abruptly relaxes into a philosophical exposition on the nature of society and the origins of insanity. Ryu did not revel in the blood and action; he shocks you with the scene, then reveals what's behind the mask. I found that admirable.
If it wasn't obvious, I enjoyed this story, and I normally shy away from violent depictions of immolation, beheading, rape, and other such visual horrors as we are exposed to in Miso Soup. I think that authors often get caught up in the lawlessness and thrill of writing disgusting scenes that shock the audience and forget to explain why they wrote it in the first place. This was different. Although many would call this work a thriller, I can't describe it as anything but a philosophical fiction. The plot only serves as a vehicle for Ryu to express his frustration with the empty people around him, and to comment on the lowest reaches of human life. Although somewhat negative in outlook overall, I think Miso Soup is Ryu asking us to take a look around and smell the roses, before someone snaps and rips our head off.