What's Left of Me Is Yours

A Novel

By: Stephanie Scott

Narrated by: Janet Song, Emily Woo Zeller

Length: 11 hrs and 31 mins

Publisher's summary

"Each chapter of this enrapturing novel is elegantly brief and charged with barely contained emotion." (New York Times Book Review)

A gripping debut set in modern-day Tokyo and inspired by a true crime, for readers and listeners of Everything I Never Told You and The Perfect Nanny, What's Left of Me Is Yours charts a young woman's search for the truth about her mother's life - and her murder.

In Japan, a covert industry has grown up around the wakaresaseya (literally "breaker-upper"), a person hired by one spouse to seduce the other in order to gain the advantage in divorce proceedings. When Satō hires Kaitarō, a wakaresaseya agent, to have an affair with his wife, Rina, he assumes it will be an easy case. But Satō has never truly understood Rina or her desires, and Kaitarō's job is to do exactly that - until he does it too well. While Rina remains ignorant of the circumstances that brought them together, she and Kaitarō fall in a desperate, singular love, setting in motion a series of violent acts that will forever haunt her daughter's life.

Told from alternating points of view and across the breathtaking landscapes of Japan, Stephanie Scott exquisitely renders the affair and its intricate repercussions. As Rina's daughter, Sumiko, fills in the gaps of her mother's story and her own memory, Scott probes the thorny psychological and moral grounds of the actions we take in the name of love, asking where we draw the line between passion and possession.

©2020 Stephanie Scott (P)2020 Random House Audio

Critic reviews

"Beautifully written, atmospheric, and immersive, Stephanie Scott’s What’s Left of Me Is Yours tells a propulsive story about heartbreak and loss and the greatest mystery of all, family." (Laurie Frankel, New York Times best-selling author of This Is How It Always Is)

"A brilliant debut." (Louise Doughty, author of Platform Seven and Apple Tree Yard)

"Stephanie Scott’s story of a woman’s murder sweeps the reader into a world in which love is fused with betrayal and truth is locked away. Beautiful, delicate and brutal, What’s Left of Me Is Yours, is difficult to put down, impossible to forget." (Marti Leimbach, best-selling author of Dying Young and Daniel Isn't Talking)

Felt like Two Different Authors

This book was longer than it needed to be. Narrator Emily was a fantastic voice and her words were rich and flowed with passion. Janet’s narration was staccato with flat sentences. It felt like two authors. If that was the authors intent, she succeeded but I didn’t care for it. I loved hearing about the justice system in Japan and customs/traditions though.

Wonderful book

This is a book with such poignancy and depth, I would recommend it whole heartedly.

Something missing

The story and the performance could have been more emotionally charged given the subject matter. Perhaps it is the sensibility of the culture but I waited and waited for the fire but there was none. Even the confrontations fell flat.

Dissappoing

I was looking forward to this book as the reviews were wonderful. I'll allow that the print version could be better, since the narration here was simply awful. The voices were so monotone that I didn't even realize there were 2 narrators till I heard the credits at the end. The story itself is not very well written: for such a dreadful crime, there isn't any emotional uptick as it unfolds. For all the narrator's claims of life-long damage, there is no evidence of it. I did manage to finish it, but just barely.

nice writing of a boring story

I struggled to finish this as nothing gripping happened. It is a beautiful told tale of love and loss. The differences in the Japanese penal system was interesting, but there wasn't enough to keep me engaged.

Excellent book

This book deserves a comment. Deeply felt book, feelings dramatized, emotions explored and incite full. Tasted like a lite wine it moves along taste by taste each bit to be savored. It seems slow because it is deep. The narrative is of a murder but it is seen from multi parts , the victim, father, Daughter and lover. A classic. Probably a best seller and book club favorite . Deep lnto Japanese law and culture it becomes engrossing and worth the effort to listen. Not the usual who done it but why it was done. Worth the time to listen.

This book stuck with me

From glancing into the Japanese criminal justice system to the delicate yet deep portrayal of a young woman’s sense of loss (and purpose), this story keeps popping into my mind every time someone asks for a book recommendation.

With 4 hours plus left to go, I gave up

I tried to like this. The narrator was flawless but the plot and the characters, not so much. Every time the story got moving, it got bogged down again with endless repetition unnecessary drama, angst, hesitation and the plot just bottomed out again. I finally made the decision to bag it because I could not wait another 4 hours to figure out what happened because by then, I just didn't care.

Wanted to love it but couldn't

I felt like the story went around in a giant circle and left much to be desired. I found myself struggling getting through it and was at least hoping there was going be a huge lead up to the climax but there never seemed to be any. The performance was superbly done and the book itself was beautifully written but this just made it more of a let down because it had such potential to be great and it just fell short in my opinion.