Intimacies

 Intimacies by Katie Kitamura is a her fourth novel.  Written from the unnamed narrators point of view, this is a short novel that packs a punch.

The protagonist is a young woman who moves for her new job as an interrupter at The Hague.  The description of the job is fascinating in itself.  The entire book is written in the first person from the young woman's perspective of scenes in her life.  Just  as she must remain objective and unemotional when translating for a client in the court, she approaches her life in a similar manner.

We never learn her name, the book is a stream of consciousness with little punctuation, no quotation marks around conversations,  a very little emotion.  Yet as the reader you can feel the tension, the terror and the uncomfortableness of the narrator in  various situations.

Her relationships with friends and her lover are awkward.  Her relationship at work is difficult.  She does not seem to know how to be intimate in contrast to the title of the book.

This book though not well liked by the members of the book group created a terrific conversation and revealed so many themes and connections throughout the novel that in the end ..I would say  it is a great read.