Jayne Joso

Jayne Joso, Chisenji temple, Niigata, Japan in 2014, photographed by Tamura, Hiromichi

Jayne Joso, British novelist, playwright, writer, artist. Having lived and worked in Japan, China, and Kenya, she now lives in the UK.

Her first novel Soothing Music for Stray Cats was published in 2009. The Times Literary Supplement projected that it ‘may emerge as one of the great, eccentric London novels’. Social historian Joe Moran heralded it as ‘the debut of a distinctive voice in contemporary British fiction’, and Natalie Haynes, author and BBC2 The Review Show panelist, described it as ‘an unexpected and moving story about the redemption of misfits and the consolation of strangers’. Joso has a huge fascination with architecture, ever present in her fictional works. Alongside numerous commissions for fictional accounts of architectural space, and writing with a deep sense of place, she has written for publications such as Architecture Today magazine and German publisher, Prestel Art. Her non-fiction work also includes ghost writing on architecture. Joso is the subject of several works of art by Japanese sculptor, Hiroki Godengi, and others by British artist Zoe Schieppati-Emery who created a series of nude works using a complex process of liquid light both on glass and paper.

Jayne Joso pictured by the stone sculpture of herself by Japanese sculptor and painter Hiroki Godengi

In 2010 Joso's first novel Soothing Music for Stray Cats was shortlisted for the People’s Book Prize (founding patron Dame Beryl Bainbridge). Her second novel Perfect Architect was published in 2011. In 2012 she was awarded The Coracle, Ireland, International Writer's Residency - A Sense of Place - Wexford, Ireland. In March 2015 an early version of the opening to her third novel My Falling Down House was published in NWR magazine. My Falling Down House finally published in 2016, and recipient of the Great Britain Sasakawa Foundation Award - given to a work of fiction or non-fiction that helps to interpret modern Japan. In 2016 Joso gained the support of Arts Council England in the form of funding the time to write her fourth novel From Seven to the Sea.

Jayne Joso in Japan

Novels

Soothing Music for Stray Cats (2009) - set almost entirely in London during the recession, the novel explores the lives of disaffected city dwellers and delves into the disconnectedness of modern life. An early review in Planet Magazine, issue 95, described it as being "reminiscent of Holden Caulfield's voice in J.D.Salinger's Catcher in the Rye". The Times Literary Supplement felt that it "may emerge as one of the great, eccentric London novels"; and social historian Joe Moran heralded it as "the debut of a distinctive voice in contemporary British fiction". It is now heavily cited in Green’s Dictionary of Slang (2010) by the English-speaking world’s leading lexicographer of slang Jonathon Green.

Perfect Architect (2011) draws on Joso's fascination for architecture and the idea of the ideal dwelling place. The Times Literary Supplement described it as a work “Full of originality"; and Publishers Weekly, New York, wrote "Joso maintains a fine balance between the intellectual and the emotional". In ICON Magazine (issue 099, 2011) a full page discussion was offered by Agata Pyzik "Joso uses all the devices of modern fiction to render the elusiveness of designing... the name of Coover – recalling the American postmodern writer Robert Coover, who specialises in elaborate parodies and disrupting myths – is perhaps revealing... There are echoes of a Thomas Mann-style Künstlerroman – charting an apprentice’s growth to maturity... an illuminating read".

Plays

China’s Smile commissioned in celebration of China’s Children’s Day (1 June) enjoyed a long theatre run and was later televised.

Short Stories

Purple Beach - first published online by 3:AM Magazine, 2012

To the Lighthouse - first published in print by NWR magazine, Autumn 2012 issue #97 (inspired by the work of Virginia Woolf)

Tokyo Spaces - commissioned for 100th Anniversary edition of NWR magazine, published in print, Summer 2013 issue #100

Fox Man - first published in print by NWR magazine, Autumn 2014 issue #105

Children's Books

How do you Feel? commissioned and published by Benesse, Japan.

Poetry

Desire - first published by Abe's Penny, New York (2010), and acquired as part of archive by New York's Museum of Modern Art - MoMA Library for its permanent collection in 2013; Brooklyn Museum Library added the work to its permanent collection in 2014.

External links

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