Solo Dance was a short but intense read which deals with some dark themes including homophobia, rape and suicide. As such, this piece won't be for everyone, but I found it engaging and thought-provoking, as well as interesting in the way it looked at evolving LGBT acceptance (or not) in Taiwan and Japan. I found it bleak, but not depressing, and I enjoyed all the literary and cultural references throughout. Reactions to this book will vary, I think, but if the darker subject matter doesn't put you off, I think you will find this book as worthwhile read.

Gloomy novella that purports to be about the gay experience in corporate Japan but isn't very insightful beyond the obvious (it's still sorta taboo/Japanese salarymen are obsessed with work) presented in a prose style that's lifeless and unengaging. The characters are instantly forgettable, the dialogue is trite, no particular scene stands out, and I would've expected more about what it's like to be a foreigner in Japan (ie. not completely accepted) but that's kinda glossed over too. Overall a very unimpressive read, so no surprise it won a bunch of awards!

Solo Dance is an emotional queer story about a woman who experiences a life-altering trauma and afterwards changes her name and moves from Taiwan to Japan. She tries to begin again, form new relationships, and build a career, but she is haunted by her past and by the suffering around her. She is a lesbian and dates women but is still struggling to fully accept herself.

The side characters are important in this story and we get to learn pieces about their lives throughout the book. I did really enjoy how these characters and their experiences intertwined. There are also some parts that have a sense of solidarity and support. I liked the role that literature and poetry played in this book as well- characters often use lines from these texts to express their emotions when they don't know how to use their own words.

This is primarily a story about mental health and honestly, it is very bleak. There are some moments of joy and community, but they are largely overshadowed by the sadness in this book. I expected this book to have heartbreaking moments based on the synopsis, but I was not prepared for the depths of how depressing it was.

I hesitate to discuss this book without detailed content warnings. I'll list them here because I really think it's important for readers to be prepared and make an informed choice about whether or not to read it.
CW: homophobia (internalized and external, including violence), rape, suicide, unexpected death, grief, PTSD, self-harm, forced outing of a queer character

I received an e-ARC of this book from NetGalley to review.

In 2021, Li Kotomi’s most recent book won Japan’s prestigious Akutagawa Prize, and now her debut Solo Dance’s been made available in English. Born in Taiwan, Li lives in Japan and writes in Japanese, although her work straddles aspects of Japanese and Taiwanese culture, reflecting her fascination with both countries’ literary history. And Solo Dance’s filled with references to Japanese and Taiwanese fiction, in particular the work of Osamu Dazai and Qiu Maiojin. In many ways Solo Dance reads like a homage to Qiu Miaojin’s haunting, now-classic, depictions of her existence as a Taiwanese lesbian - although the intense feelings of estrangement documented by Li’s central character also conjure up Dazai’s solitary, isolated outsiders.

Li’s novel, although it’s closer in scale to a novella, isn’t strictly autobiographical but draws extensively on her personal experiences, and many features of her main character’s life history line up with Li’s own. Solo Dance’s told from the perspective of Zhao Yingmei who’s reinvented herself, leaving her home in Taiwan for Japan, and changing her name to Cho Norie. Now 27, Cho works in a prestigious, mainstream corporation based in Tokyo but despite her outwardly enviable lifestyle, she’s struggling to stay afloat. As her story unfolds Li gradually reveals fragments of Cho’s past in Taiwan, and the lingering impact of the brutal, homophobic attack that led to her flight.

Woven into Cho’s narrative are intriguing glimpses of the evolving gay and lesbian cultures of Taiwan and Japan, from local online forums to Taiwan’s Pride parades and Shinjuku’s legendary Ni-Chōme quarter. Its thriving clubs and bars an oasis in Japan’s "queer desert". Closeted at work, and at home in Taiwan, it’s only here, in the company of other lesbians, that Cho’s able to express herself but even so there’s some part of her that remains in the shadows. Like Qiu Miaojin, Li deals with painful territory, violence, trauma, loss and alienation, but she also holds out the possibility of community and reconciliation. Like so many first novels, this often seemed overly packed, and sometimes too compressed, there are even moments that come a little too close to the realm of melodrama. The final section’s slightly awkwardly structured and viewed from some angles the ending’s not entirely credible but from another it’s an interesting reworking of concepts of fate and connection drawn from traditional Taiwanese belief systems. This is by no means a perfect piece but at its strongest I found it incredibly moving, with passages of beautifully-composed prose, and flashes of powerful imagery. Arthur Reiji Morris’s translation’s fluid and convincing.