Breasts and Eggs

A novel that “considers the agency . . . women exert over their bodies and charts the emotional underpinnings of physical changes . . . with humor and empathy” ( The New Yorker ). On a sweltering summer day, Makiko travels from Osaka to Tokyo, where her sister Natsu lives. She is in the company of her daughter, Midoriko, who has lately grown silent, finding herself unable to voice the vague yet overwhelming pressures associated with adolescence. Over the course of t