I think it's mostly the setting that reminds me of The Factory by Hiroko Oyamada, because the themes are very different, but it's made me decide that I want to read more weird/horrific litfic about factories and workplaces. There's something about the dispassionate reporting of events and routine, the helpless monotony, the cognitive dissonance and all that that I find very interesting.

Anyway, I especially like the way the chapters end with a visceral sentence that contains all the moral/emotional humanity that's absent from before, like the sound of a car screeching to a halt after slamming on the brakes or the narrative jolting awake after having been sleepwalking.

I had to look up what a coypu was. Apparently they’re called “discount capybaras”, which is the funniest thing I heard today. But they’re actually more similar to beavers, and they are notorious for converting wetland marshes into open water after eating up river flora & digging up roots for burrowing.

Wikipedia says: “Unlike other common disturbances in marshlands, such as fire and tropical storms, which are a once- or few-times-a-year occurrence, nutrias feed year round, so their effects on the marsh are constant. Also, nutrias are typically more destructive in the winter than in the growing season, due largely to the scarcity of above-ground vegetation.”

Apparently they also host hella parasites and zoonotic diseases, and they can contaminate water bodies through urine & feces.

“Nutrias are considered a global alien species and have potential to spread disease to livestock and humans. Native to the southern hemisphere and spreading globally requires preventive monitoring for zoonotic disease transmission. Increased local awareness of viral, bacterial and parasitic transmission from nutria to humans and livestock will be of greater importance as climate change progresses.”

How fun!

They’re native to Central & South America, thrive in neotropical environments, and have spread globally through the fur trades. They are now found on every continent except Australia and Antarctica. After escaping the trades in Japan, they took up residences in many local reservoirs, marshes, and farms.

Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nutria Japan Times: https://www.japantimes.co.jp/life/2003/01/27/environment/nutria/