My Beautiful Shadow

I have a secret. I belong to a club. And my club is the biggest, best kept secret in all of Tokyo. Kayo-chan goes about her life, raising a family and coping with inquisitive neighbours in a claustrophobic suburban neighbourhood in Japan. One day, her husband hands her a credit card. Her first purchase: a Louis Vuitton tote bag worth 2,00,000 yen. Thrilled by the comfort of this buy, Kayo ventures out a few days later, to acquire a few more things. And before she knows it, the need has become a hunger, an obsession that threatens to take over completely. Then a chance meeting reunites her with her childhood friend Tomoko, and she is swept into a world of glamour and fashion she finds irresistible. Until the phone calls begin. My Beautiful Shadow is a powerful novel about one woman’s addiction and entrapment, and a mesmerizing tale of consumerism gone mad.