Reviewed by Jeanne Johnson
Every so often Shinohara Udo turns out a real clunker. Her 'Half and
Quarter', about a psychic who only picks up on animals' thoughts, was
one. This is another.
You'd better be a fan of the yakuza to read this. It's set in what I'm
told is a realistic version of Hong Kong's gangster world, where the naive young kid who
looks like bait for the bigger fish learns to be a tough (well, Shinohara tough) survivor
thanks to the cool good-looking 'older brother' Yun who takes an interest in him. Yun has
a secret, the mysterious messages he keeps getting on his pager. Kid naturally discovers
the secret. No spoilers if I say that the Mr. S.O.C. he goes to meet isn't his male
lover, as I'd hoped. Meanwhile yakuza politics and power plays work their way out to the
usual sentimental ending found in both the yakuza genre and Shinohara's stories.
As ever, there's no overt yaoi here but lots of unspoken emotional
connection leading to a heavy atmosphere of homoeroticism. Kizuna this isn't. That, from
this reader's pov, is the story's only attraction. Maybe it's different if you're a fan of
here and now reality, however ugly and depressing-- and make no mistake, life among
Shinohara's poor Hong Kong slum residents is ugly and depressing. Or maybe it helps to be
a fan of violence, because there's lots of that too. I found the combination
queasy-making. And it certainly helps to be Chinese. Shinohara is a fan of Hong Kong
everything. She lards her story with Chinese phrases using Chinese kanji which are
different enough from Japanese kanji that this foreigner at least can't make any sense of
them. ('Very much, truly' is written with characters that I would read as 'the genuine
person in charge.') So instead of reading the kanji, as in Japanese, you have to squint at
the tiny furigana printed next to them to find out what these guys are saying. If
Shinohara's Chinese is as dated as her English, it might be amusing. Mr. S.O.C. is Mr.
Suit Of Clothes. Why? Because he always wears a jacket and tie however hot it is. And when
was the last time you called that outfit a suit of clothes?