Japanese contemporary fiction

Cover image for The Place of Shells by Mai Ishizawa

The Place of Shells by Mai Ishizawa (Transl. Polly Barton): Trauma, grief and memory

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I’ve often mentioned the power of novellas on this blog, how in the right hands a few pages can convey much more than several hundred. Mai Ishizawa’s prize-winning debut, The Place of Shells, is a fine example of that for me. Set during the pandemic, it’s narrated by an unnamed academic from Tōhoku, whose coastline […]

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Cover image for A Perfect Day to Be Alone by Nanae Aoyama

A Perfect Day to Be Alone by Nanae Aoyama (transl. Jesse Kirkwood): A poignant, funny coming-of-age story

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Nanae Aoyama’s A Perfect Day to Be Alone is already a bestseller in several European countries, translated into German, French and Italian before Jesse Kirkwood’s English version. Spanning a year in which twenty-year-old Chizu lives with an elderly distant relative, it’s a quiet coming-of-age story. It turned out that when you put three people with

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The Bear and the Paving Stone by Toshiyuki Horie (transl. Geraint Howells): Memory and friendship

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This is the latest in Pushkin Press’ series showcasing contemporary Japanese writing, all brightly packaged and all elegantly slim. It’s the third I’ve read: I started with Hiromi Kawakami’s surreal Record of a Night Too Brief, having enjoyed both Strange Weather in Tokyo and The Nakano Thrift Shop, then ended last year’s reviews with Mieko

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Cover image for Ms Ice Sandwich by Mieko Kawakami

Ms Ice Sandwich by Mieko Kawakami (transl. Louise Heal Kawai): In the eye of the beholder

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Mieko Kawakami is one of Haruki Murakami’s favourite young writers which made her novella hard to resist for me. Ms Ice Sandwich is the latest in a series published by Pushkin Press showcasing Japanese authors. I’ve only got around to reviewing one other– Hiromi Kawakami’s surreal Record of a Night Too Brief – which leaves

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