Hikikomori and the Rental Sister, Jeff Backhaus
Hikikomori and the Rental Sister, Jeff Backhaus
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Hikikomori and the Rental Sister

Author: Jeff Backhaus

Narrator: Stephen Bowlby

Unabridged: 6 hr 34 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Published: 01/08/2013

Categories: Fiction, Psychological


Synopsis

Thomas Tessler, devastated by a tragedy, has cloistered himself in his bedroom and shut out the world for the past three years. His wife, Silke, lives in the next room, but Thomas no longer shares his life with her, leaving his hideout only in the wee hours of the night to buy food at the store around the corner from their Manhattan apartment. Isolated, withdrawn, damaged, Thomas is hikikomori.
 
 Desperate to salvage their life together, Silke hires Megumi, a young Japanese woman attuned to the hikikomori phenomenon, to lure Thomas back into the world. In Japan Megumi is called a “rental sister,” though her job may involve much more than familial comforts. As Thomas grows to trust Megumi, a deepening and sensual relationship unfolds. But what are the risks of such intimacy? And what must these three broken people surrender in order to find hope?
 
 Revelatory and provocative, Hikikomori and the Rental Sister tears through the emotional walls of grief and delves into the power of human connection to break through to the waiting world outside.

About Jeff Backhaus

Jeff Backhaus has been a cook, an art director, and a professional pilot. He has lived and worked in Korea, and now lives in New York.


Reviews

Hikikomori is a Japanese term for social isolation, a withdrawal from society. Thomas withdraws after the death of his son. He feels guilt and depression from the death. He isolates himself for over 3 years. His wife, Silke, hires a "rental sister" who the Japanese use to try and lure the isolated o......more

Goodreads review by Bandit

Abbreviated from its original name to omit Hikikomori, the word and lifestyle unfamiliar to many, but of a real presence in its native Japan. Hikikomori are shut ins, those who no longer wish to be part of the world. It's a fascinating thing psychologically and there isn't much about it in fiction,......more

Goodreads review by Deborah

I am in literary heaven lately. I have had the joy of reading such transcendent books that they all deserve the highest accolades, and this one is no exception. Hikikomori is the name in Japan for a person who retreats from the world after a tragedy. In this case, Thomas and his wife live in New Yor......more