Midway through Audition, the fifth and latest novel from Katie Kitamura, the unnamed narrator, an actor, muses on a particularly successful moment of performance. She’s the star of a buzzy new play, and in a solo scene at its “hinge,” she must transform from a “woman in grief” to a “woman of action.” During rehearsals, the scene bedeviled her, but since the play’s debut, she’s been eager for the transitional moment to arrive. “I longed for it in a way that was almost carnal,” she reflects. Each time she steps into the spotlight, the audience ceases to exist, and the narrator explores the scene and its many possibilities. Ironically, she never feels more like herself than when she’s acting in this scene: “here, the gap between my private and performed selves collapsed, and for the briefest of moments there was only a single, unified self.”
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