The novel follows a pregnant woman, apparently in her late thirties or around forty, over the course of a single day and night in Tokyo, while her mind moves through decades of memory. The opening scene is ordinary on the surface: she has just had blood drawn at a maternity clinic. Yet this routine prenatal […]
The book is narrated by a woman whose life has been stripped of ordinary purpose by AI, work, and the hunger to be useful. The story begins not in the everyday world but inside a hyper-realistic zombie game world, in a mountain hotel called something like The Plugged Hill. The narrator is the hotel’s sole […]
The protagonist, Nogami, is a married woman approaching middle age who works in public relations for S Corporation, a food-related company that is publicly celebrated as a progressive and employee-friendly workplace. The novel opens before dawn, while Nogami lies awake beside her peacefully sleeping husband. She has been suffering from severe insomnia for months. Unable […]
Hooked opens with Eriko Shimura, a thirty-year-old elite employee at a major Japanese trading company, arriving at her office before dawn. Eriko is disciplined, ambitious, immaculately groomed, and fiercely invested in the idea that time is the most precious resource in life. She lives with her parents, works relentlessly, and believes that constant self-improvement is […]
This Japanese novel is a poignant and reflective tale about conjoined twins who share a single body and their quest to understand their shared existence. Author Asahina, a doctor and novelist, blends his medical expertise with deep human empathy to create a narrative that’s both unique and compelling. The story offers profound insights and endearing […]
Why are books worth preserving? What can they teach us? Dinner at the Night Library is about a library with a difference on the outskirts of Tokyo. The books it houses are from the libraries of deceased authors, and are on public display but not for loan. The privately owned library opens only at night, and is […]
A gritty noir page-turner weaving together family, money, and crime, Mieko Kawakami’s Sisters in Yellow follows a girl as she sheds the shackles of her upbringing and seeks to break free from soul-crushing poverty. Underneath lies a probing exploration of human dignity and ethics—a depth that gave Kawakami’s Breasts and Eggs and Heaven their emotional heft. Our lives may appear to […]
The story is narrated by The Woman in the Yellow Cardigan, who becomes infatuated with a woman known as “The Woman in the Purple Skirt” in her neighbourhood. The narrator’s intense interest in the Woman in the Purple Skirt leads to an unhealthy obsession, with her closely tracking the woman’s daily activities. As the story […]
In Kazuo Ishiguro’s novel, “Klara and the Sun,” we are introduced to a world where Artificial Intelligence has evolved to a point where robots like Klara and Rosa, the B2 model, are designed as companions for children. These robots are highly functional but docile, and as the story begins, they sit in a shop, eagerly […]
This is a unique and imaginative novel that tells the story of Rika Horauchi, a reserved young woman who takes on an unconventional part-time job at a museum. Her role is to engage in Latin conversations with a statue of Venus, who miraculously comes to life during the museum’s closing hours. The narrative is a […]