JULIE OTSUKA was born and raised in California. She is a
recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship, and her first novel, When the
Emperor Was Divine won the 2003 Asian American Literary Award and
the 2003 American Library Association's Alex Award. Her second
novel, The Buddha in the Attic, was a finalist for the National
Book Award in 2011 and won the 2012 PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction
and the 2011 Langum Prize in American Historical Fiction. The
Buddha in the Attic was an international best seller and the winner
of the prestigious Prix Femina Étranger in 2012, and the Albatros
Literaturpreis in 2013. She lives in New York City.
CARNEGIE MEDAL FOR EXCELLENCE WINNER • A Best Book of the Year:
VOGUE and KIRKUS
“Otsuka’s prose is powerfully subdued: She builds lists and
litanies that appear unassuming, even quotidian, until the
paragraph comes to an end, and you find yourself stunned by what
she has managed, your throat tight with the beautiful detail . . .
This is a novel of not just accumulation, but repetition, scenes
looping in the way that the mind does, or the way swimmers swim
laps. Compounded, these accretions build to an incredible feeling
of loss, and too-late-ness . . . In a time of monotony and chaos,
when death is as concrete as it is unimaginable, and when cracks
can and do appear in the pool for no discernible reason, The
Swimmers is an exquisite companion.” –Rachel Khong, The New York
Times Book Review
"Once per decade we are graced with a new book by Otsuka, the
award-winning author of 2012’s The Buddha in the Attic and 2003’s
When The Emperor Was Divine. This year’s novel starts as a
catalogue of spoken and unspoken rules for swimmers at an aquatic
center but unfolds into a powerful story of a mother’s dementia and
her daughter’s love. If Otsuka doesn’t write another novel for
several years, it will be okay. This is one to be savored and
reread." –Becky Meloan, The Washington Post
“The Swimmers is a slim brilliant novel about the value and beauty
of mundane routines that shape our days and identities; or, maybe
it's a novel about the cracks that, inevitably, will one day appear
to undermine our own bodies and minds; and — who knows? — it could
also be read as a grand parable about the crack in the world
wrought by this pandemic . . . Otsuka's signature spare style as a
writer unexpectedly suits her capacious vision . . . The Swimmers
has the verve and playfulness of spoken word poetry.” –Maureen
Corrigan, Fresh Air/NPR
“Otsuka beautifully renders the particularities of a life fully
using every word, including the pronouns. She has a way of
presenting seemingly objective details, but the emotions seep
through the minutiae so that we know and feel much about Alice and
those who care for her. With virtuosity, Otsuka hands us each
crystallized inch of this tale that reflects a life — the pages
memorialize what can't be forgotten . . . The Swimmers is [an]
artfully refined story, even when it delves into the most painful
parts of life.” –Abby Manzella, Minneapolis Star-Tribune
“[The Swimmers] is a masterclass in the use of non-traditional
points-of-view. This slim, gorgeous book is divided into five
chapters . . . and provides the reader with fresh insight into both
the story being told and the craft of writing it.” —Laura
Spence-Ash, Ploughshares
“[The Swimmers] offers satirical comment on contemporary life with
nimble precision . . . Julie Otsuka finds a deft humor in each
observation.” —Benedict Nguyễn, Los Angeles Review of Books
“There are books that seem as if they were written just for me, and
Julie Otsuka’s The Swimmers is one of them . . . In Otsuka’s
signature style, The Swimmers is a grand pointillist narrative
driven by the unrelenting accretion of details like dots of color
filling up the canvas . . . Otsuka [is] taking the gloves off in a
way she hasn’t since the ending of When the Emperor Was Divine.”
–Alice Stephens, Washington Independent Review of Books
“A quick and tender story of a group of swimmers who cope with the
disruption of their routines in various ways . . . Otsuka cleverly
uses various points of view: the swimmers’ first-person-plural
narration effectively draws the reader into their world, while the
second person keenly conveys the experiences of Alice’s daughter,
who tries to recoup lost time with her mother after Alice loses
hold of her memories and moves into a memory care facility. It’s a
brilliant and disarming dive into the characters’ inner worlds.”
–Publishers Weekly [starred review]
“Distinguished best-selling novelist Otsuka’s (Buddha in the Attic)
latest is an introspective work that examines life’s journeys from
a multitude of perspectives . . . Otsuka’s spare, dreamlike writing
offers readers a deeply touching exploration of the impact on
Alice’s Japanese American family (particularly her daughter) of
caring for a loved one with dementia. Otsuka is noteworthy for
her skilled storytelling and her ability to immerse readers in her
characters’ emotional journeys. Essential reading for those already
familiar with Otsuka’s work; those who haven’t read her are likely
to be duly impressed." –Shirley Quan, Library Journal [starred
review]
“Julie Otsuka’s first novel in 10 years is a quiet and startling
masterpiece about memory, aging and the indelible experiences that
define a life . . . The Swimmers seems to continually reinvent
itself as each section reframes everything that came before it.
Reading something so inventive and playful is a bit like being
inside an architectural blueprint as it’s being drawn, or watching
an acorn grow into a massive oak in only a few minutes . . . With
nuance, grace and deep tenderness, Otsuka ponders the questions
that define our lives: Who are we without our memories? What does
it mean to truly see someone else, to see ourselves? What is
knowable about the world, and what do we do with the mysteries no
one can solve? Funny, moving and composed of sentences that read
like small poems, The Swimmers is a remarkable novel from a writer
with an unparalleled talent for capturing the stuff of the world,
whether mundane, harrowing or bizarre.” –Laura Sackton, BookPage
[starred review]
“Award-winning, best-selling Otsuka is averaging one book per
decade, making each exquisite title exponentially more precious.
Here she creates a stupendous collage of small moments that results
in an extraordinary examination of the fragility of quotidian human
relationships . . . Once more, Otsuka creates an elegiac,
devastating masterpiece.” –Booklist [starred review]
“Having concentrated on one family in her first novel, then
eschewed individual protagonists for a collective ‘we’ in her
second, Otsuka now blends the two approaches, shifting from an
almost impersonal, wide-lens view of society to an increasingly
narrow focus on a specific mother-daughter relationship . . . The
combination of social satire with an intimate portrait of loss and
grief is stylistically ambitious and deeply moving.” –Kirkus
Reviews [starred review]
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