Intimacies

A Novel

By: Katie Kitamura

Narrated by: Traci Kato-Kiriyama

A NEW YORK TIMES TOP 10 BOOK OF 2021

LONGLISTED FOR THE 2021 NATIONAL BOOK AWARD IN FICTION

ONE OF BARACK OBAMA’S FAVORITE 2021 READS

AN INSTANT NATIONAL BESTSELLER

A BEST BOOK OF 2021 FROM Washington Post, Vogue, Time, Oprah Daily, New York Times, Los Angeles Times, San Francisco Chronicle, Atlantic, Kirkus and Entertainment Weekly

“Intimacies is a haunting, precise, and morally astute novel that reads like a psychological thriller…. Katie Kitamura is a wonder.” —Dana Spiotta, author of Wayward and Eat the Document

“One of the best novels I’ve read in 2021.” – Dwight Garner, The New York Times

A novel from the author of A Separation, an electrifying story about a woman caught between many truths.

An interpreter has come to The Hague to escape New York and work at the International Court. A woman of many languages and identities, she is looking for a place to finally call home.

She's drawn into simmering personal dramas: her lover, Adriaan, is separated from his wife but still entangled in his marriage. Her friend Jana witnesses a seemingly random act of violence, a crime the interpreter becomes increasingly obsessed with as she befriends the victim's sister. And she's pulled into an explosive political controversy when she’s asked to interpret for a former president accused of war crimes.

A woman of quiet passion, she confronts power, love, and violence, both in her personal intimacies and in her work at the Court. She is soon pushed to the precipice, where betrayal and heartbreak threaten to overwhelm her, forcing her to decide what she wants from her life.

Good Story - Tough Narration

Hard to get attached to the story with a halting monotone narration. Not much dialogue to work with.

Pretty Good

I'm not sure what this book was really about. A woman moves to The Hague in Amsterdam as an interpreter in the Court which entails reading the nuances of their language and tone of voice. It seems that this carries over to her relationships with her friends and acquaintances. I never got a sense of who this woman was but rather that she spends most of her time thinking about what is or isn't been said.

Interesting and relatively short

Interesting protagonist- a translator at the Hauge. I never really identified with her, her situation, or her friends but it broadened my perspective of the lives of people who live away from ‘home’, or don’t identify as having one.

Thrilling premise that falls short

I wanted to like this more, as it made me think of a profession I've never thought about (language translating at the Hague for war criminals). I thought this would be more of a psychological thriller, especially when the former president's case comes through, and the protagonist has to spend more time with this reprehensible person. You meet some interesting characters - a friend whose at the center of the art world, a new boyfriend whose still married to his cheating wife, a bookstore owner who is mysteriously assaulted. But nothing really happens in the end, and even the boyfriend plot, which takes up a significant portion of the book, doesn't resolve in a satisfying way.

Low connection

I never cared much about the protagonist. She had an important job, interesting background but did not live up to expectations of those around her.
She was used and re-used and never seemed to recognize it.