The Story of a Single Woman

A piercingly beautiful and candid novel of love, sex and independence in 1920s Japan by a trailblazing Japanese writer

"Remarkable . . . [Chiyo] has a hard, unerring eye for the tender detail" -- Financial Times

She left her home, just a girl, determined to live alone. But wasn't this the very life her late father had most fervently forbidden?

As an older woman, Kazue looks back on her tumultuous younger years with piercing clarity. Growing up in a tiny Japanese mountain village at the start of the 20th century, her life was shadowed by the demands and expectations of her troubled, alcoholic father. When her family arrange for her to marry a cousin when she is still a young teenager, Kazue stays with the boy for only 10 days before returning home alone.

This is the beginning of a life of striking independence, one which will see Kazue forced to leave her home at eighteen following a love affair and that will take her first to Korea and then to Tokyo. Driven by her impulses and an indomitable spirit of hope, Kazue moves from one relationship to another, hungry for experience. Ultimately, she takes to writing as a means to live a life on her own terms.

Candidly told and full of stunning imagery, The Story of a Single Woman is an autobiographical novel by one of Japan's most significant 20th-century writers, a trailblazer who lived and wrote like no-one else.

Author: Chiyo Uno
Publisher: Pushkin Press Classics
Published: 04/29/2025
Pages: 160
Binding Type: Paperback
Weight: 0.30lbs
Size: 7.70h x 5.10w x 0.60d
ISBN: 9781805332312


Review Citation(s):
Library Journal 02/01/2025 pg. 63
Shelf Awareness 04/26/2025

About the Author
Uno Chiyo was born in 1897 in Iwakuni, Japan. She began writing in the early 1920s. Initially best known for her scandalous life, she came eventually to be recognized for her mastery of writing. She wrote several notable works, including a memoir that was adapted into a television series, and also became well known as a kimono designer. She died in 1996 aged 98.

Rebecca Copeland is a writer of fiction and literary criticism and a translator of Japanese literature. She earned a PhD in Japanese literature at Columbia University, and she is now a professor at Washington University in St. Louis.