The Japanese novel Butter by Asako Yuzuki, with its striking yellow cover complete with a cartoon cow and blood smear, has become a massive hit in the West. The marketing around it suggests it’s the Japanese version of what sells in this country – true crime and airport thrillers. The tagline on the U.S. edition calls it “a novel of food and murder,” which hints at ridiculous twists and turns, edge-of-your-seat pacing, and a puzzling whodunnit. That is not this book. Butter much more complex and layered than this marketing suggests and searing in its feminist commentary.

And, yes, it is a novel of food and murder, but with more focus on food rather than murder. In fact, I would say the murders matter little in this book. The protagonist, Rika, is a female reporter for the weekly news magazine at a major newspaper. She is aiming to get an interview with a woman awaiting trial for killing her older male lovers. Kajii, this alleged serial killer, is all over the media and a constant topic of conversation, yet she refuses to sit down for interviews.

Rika is intrigued and fascinated by Kajii and her case, and she does something no male reporter was able to do: Earn Kajii’s favor by asking her for a recipe. Kajii agrees to meet Rika, not for a formal interview, but to talk about cooking and food. Kajii is – by Japanese standards – fat. (Her weight in kilos is mentioned, and when I did the conversion, I laughed because this character is only 150 pounds.) Much of Kajii’s notoriety and media attention centers around her size and love of food. She studied traditional French cooking and is obsessed with quality butter and dairy products. Kajii and Rika develop a rapport, but the former still refuses to sit for a formal interview. Rather, she leads Rika on by giving her strange assignments involving food: try a recipe using a specific type of expensive butter, go to a French fine dining restaurant, eat a slice of a limited edition holiday cake. As Kajii’s assignments become more and more challenging and bizarre, Rika’s life gets turned upside-down as she attempts to complete them.

Yet, Rika also learns to love eating in the process. When the novel starts, Rika is the type of person who views food as fuel, eating low-calorie convenience foods, picking at meals at restaurants, and intentionally maintaining a thin figure – perhaps too thin for her height. As Rika completes Kajii’s assignments, she discovers the pleasure of eating to such an extent that she opens up new parts of herself and experiences life in ways she hadn’t before considered. I hadn’t read a book in which a character discovers the joy of eating with this much detail, so much so that it becomes conduit for that character’s transformation.

I also found Rika’s obsession with Kajii gripping, even as I found it frustrating and disturbing. At several moments, I didn’t quite understand why Rika would twist herself in knots for Kajii. Is it just to get the scoop? Or is it coming from something more sinister inside herself? I have found myself fascinated by infamous women who did terrible things, often defending them because the media and our culture treat them so badly, especially compared to men who do worse. In this way, I could understand Rika’s open-mindedness to Kajii, even when I was so exacerbated with Rika’s choices that I almost threw the book across the room.

Additionally, Rika’s relationship with her best friend Reiko is central to the plot, and it’s a really lovely portrayal of a long-term, complicated female friendship. Butter is perhaps a little heavy-handed in its feminist themes, but I didn’t mind. I will be thinking about this book for weeks to come, especially the next time I eat something full of butter.

Romance-In-Brief

I recently listened to a handful of romance audiobooks, and I wanted to give a shout-out to two I very much enjoyed:

Overdue by Stephanie Perkins: A slow-burn romance between two library workers. It’s sweet, with characters who felt like real people I might know. (My favorite kind of romance.)

Rooting Interest by Cat Disabato: A Sapphic sports romance about a WNBA player and a sports journalist, so charming! I’ve determined I only like sports romances when they’re queer. (I quickly binged watched the new straight, sexy hockey show. It’s enjoyable, but it’s no Heated Rivalry…)