She regularly says and does the wrong thing- like hitting a boy over the head with a shovel in school to break up a fight, or asking to eat a dead budgie in the park, struggling completely to understand why these things were unacceptable. Keiko is socially awkward, and a constant worry to her family. While autism is never mentioned in the book, many autistic women have felt a real connection with Keiko and her struggles. Things become so bad that Keiko goes so far as to adopt an obnoxious former employee at the store as a room mate/ “pet” to get the world off of her back and to let them assume that she is in a relationship and finally acting “normal”. As she approaches her late thirties, her family and friends become increasingly invasive in their questioning of her lifestyle- why has she never moved on from the store? Why hasn’t she married? Why won’t she try to be like everyone else? Everyone wants to “fix” Keiko so that she will become a “normal”, functioning member of society. Keiko is considered somewhat of an anomaly in Japanese society, as convenience store jobs are considered stop gaps for students, job seekers, housewives etc. But as content as Keiko may be, the world is not content with her life. She is content with her life in the store, happily set in routine as a functional cog in the “machine of society”. The book tells the story of convenience store (or konbini) worker Keiko Furukura, a 36 year old woman who has worked part time in her local store for the last 18 years.
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