Heaven

Told through the eyes of a 14-year-old boy subjected to relentless bullying, this is a haunting novel about the threat of violence that can stalk our teenage years.  Instead of putting up resistance, the boy suffers in complete resignation. His sole ally is a girl classmate, similarly outcast and preyed upon by the bullies. They meet in secret to take solace in each other’s company, unaware that their relationship has not gone unnoticed by their tormentors…

Mieko Kawakami’s deceptively simple yet profound work stands as a testament to her remarkable literary talent. Here, she asks us to question the fate of the meek in a society that favours the strong, and the lengths to which even children will go in their learnt cruelty.  Translated by Sam Bett & David Boyd.

"An intense, claustrophobic novel, Heaven uses its tale of middle school bullying to enact Nietzsche's critique of morality."  — The 2022 International Booker Prize judges

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Mieko Kawakami made her literary debut as a poet in 2006, & published her first novella, My Ego, My Teeth & the World, in 2007.

Sam Bett: “I see Mieko’s approach to gender as an interrogation of assigned roles. Heaven is about the conundrum that inevitably results from saying yes to life: how can we love life on the one hand, & be so angry at the terms of our existence on the other? An interesting aspect of gender in Heaven is how comfortable the narrator & Kojima feel around each other, discovering a space where they can be themselves, while feeling no affinity for the other boys or girls in class. More than this, though, I think Heaven is concerned with conflicts between alpha leaders & omega loners. Among the harsher premises of the novel is that the two main bullies, Momose & Ninomiya, are also the smartest & most handsome guys at school. At least in American literature & film, we tend to depict bullies as monstrous Goliath types, loud & g