Tired of doing all the menial office tasks in addition to her regular workload, Ms. Shibata declares she is pregnant. She keeps a pregnancy diary, goes to mothers-to-be aerobics class, and it appears she believes she is actually pregnant. Her co-workers start treating her differently. This is an unusual novel about gender discrimination in the workplace.
It is set in Japan, where presumably it is still expected that women will take over the roles of serving tea to visitors, making coffee, and cleaning the office’s refrigerator. I enjoyed the early parts of the novel. It takes a rather strange turn in the middle, when Ms. Shibata starts talking to the Virgin Mary, and it lost me at that point.
Tired of doing all the menial office tasks in addition to her regular workload, Ms. Shibata declares she is pregnant. She keeps a pregnancy diary, goes to mothers-to-be aerobics class, and it appears she believes she is actually pregnant. Her co-workers start treating her differently. This is an unusual novel about gender discrimination in the workplace.
It is set in Japan, where presumably it is still expected that women will take over the roles of serving tea to visitors, making coffee, and cleaning the office’s refrigerator. I enjoyed the early parts of the novel. It takes a rather strange turn in the middle, when Ms. Shibata starts talking to the Virgin Mary, and it lost me at that point.