but not somewhere in between

I bought the book despite the cover.

     Even two months after I've read Audition, I cannot decide if I like or dislike it. It's so cleverly written, but it feels so hollow. I finished it in a night - and in the darkness, I kept thinking, "so what?" In truth, I bought the book because I came across a breath-taking quote from it. I still love the quote, but it is an unfinished promise. A disappointing titillation. It is that striking person that walks into the room for an audition - who seems perfect, really, if he didn't look at you with the eyes of someone who couldn't even understand himself.

  "So, what do you think?" he asked, but not in the spirit of actually soliciting her opinion. It was more of an attempt to confirm what he already knew: She's really something, isn't she? You just don't find young women like her any more. You see that, don't you?

  "Strange girl," Kai said, exhaling smoke.

  "Strange?"

  "I've never met a girl quite like that before."

  "Well, it's a whole new generation, Kai." 

  "That's true, but some things never change. What's most important to a person, that's the question. Always has been and always will be. When I meet someone, I can usually tell within a minute or two what it is they value most. The young people nowadays - men and women, amateurs and pros - generally fall into one of two categories: either they don't know what it is that's most important to them, or they know but don't have the power to go after it. But this girl's different. She knows what's most important to her and she knows how to get it, but she doesn't let on what it is. I'm pretty sure it's not money or success, or a normal happy life, or a strong man, or some weird religion, but that's about all I can tell you. She's like smoke: you think you're seeing her clearly enough, but when you reach for her there's nothing there. That's a sort of strength, I suppose. But it makes her hard to figure out." 

  "She's nice though, right?" Aoyama said. 

  Kai seemed taken aback by this. She shook her head and stubbed out her cigarette. 

  "Is that really what you think?" she said. 

  A simple question, but it rocked him. He knew perfectly well that Yamasaki Asami wasn't simply a nice girl, and yet that was how he'd chosen to think of her. Kai had put her finger on this bald self-deception, and he had the odd sensation of wanting to be surprised but not being able to. 

   "Anyway," he said, "I'm sure she's not a bad person. I'm pretty serious about her." 

   Kai frowned and shook her head again. 

  "Nice person, bad person - that's not the level this girl is at. I can see you're crazy about her and probably won't be able to hear this, Ao-chan, but I think you'd be better of staying away from someone like her. I can't read her exactly, but I can tell you she's either a saint or a monster. Maybe both extremes at once, but not somewhere in between."