"What are you looking for? So asks Tokyo's most enigmatic librarian. For Sayuri Komachi is able to sense exactly what each visitor to her library is searching for and provide just the book recommendation to help them find it. A restless retail assistant looks to gain new skills, a mother tries to overcome demotion at work after maternity leave, a conscientious accountant yearns to open an antique store, a recently retired salaryman searches for newfound...

FINALIST for the 2022 National Book Critics Circle Award for Fiction A BEST BOOK OF 2022 Oprah Daily·TIME Magazine·Washington Post·Publishers Weekly·Lit Hub Bestselling author of Breasts and Eggs Mieko Kawakami invites readers back into her immediately recognizable fictional world with this new, extraordinary novel and demonstrates yet again why she is one of today's most uncategorizable, insightful, and talented novelists. Fuyuko Irie is a freelance...

In this fifth installment in the series, "readers meet a young boy trying to come to terms with his parents' divorce ('The Son'); a new mother whose husband was killed before he could meet and name their infant daughter ('The Nameless Child'); a woman who eloped without her father's blessing and now needs his forgiveness ('The Father'); and two best friends driven apart by painful romantic secrets ('The Valentine'). The focus on regret and grief makes...

"A surreal, devastating story of a homeless ghost who haunts one of Tokyo's busiest train stations. Kazu is dead. Born in Fukushima in 1933, the same year as the Japanese Emperor, his life is tied by a series of coincidences to the Imperial family and has been shaped at every turn by modern Japanese history. But his life story is also marked by bad luck, and now, in death, he is unable to rest, doomed to haunt the park near Ueno Station in Tokyo....

Struggling San Francisco antiques dealer Jim Brodie is back in Japan. After wading through the tragedy of the Japantown murders, he and his daughter have returned for a well-earned vacation. Checking in at the P.I. firm he inherited from his father, he's startled by the arrival of an old World War II veteran and his son. The father has come explicitly to see Brodie, and offers up a dark story connected to the war and a pair of violent home invasions...

"When Nao returns to Tokyo to reconnect with her Japanese heritage, she books a yearlong stay at the Himawari sharehouse. There she meets Hyejung and Tina...The trio live together, share meals, and even attend the same Japanese-language school, which results in them becoming fast friends. But will they be able to hold one another up as life tests them with new loves, old heart breaks, and the everyday challenges of being fish out of water?"--Provided...

"After shoplifting some bread one chilly night, former high school track-and-field star kakeru Kurahara runs through the city streets. Though he has grown disillusioned with the sport, he feels as if he could keep running forever. However, his reverie is broken by a mysterious boy on a bike: Haiji Kiyose, a fellow runner who also happens to attend Kakeru's univeristy. impressed by Kakeru's agility, Kiyose persuades Kakeru to move into Chikusei-so,...