Strange Weather in Tokyo
3.490 kr.Tsukiko is in her late 30s and living alone when one night she happens to meet one of her former high school teachers, ‘Sensei’, in a bar. He is at least thirty years her senior, retired and, she presumes, a widower. After this initial encounter, the pair continue to meet occasionally to share food and drink sake, and as the seasons pass – from spring cherry blossom to autumnal mushrooms – Tsukiko and Sensei come to develop a hesitant intimacy which tilts awkwardly and poignantly into love.
Dagar mínir í Morisaki-bókabúðinni
4.790 kr.Þegar Takako missir í einu vetfangi kærastann, vinnuna og trúna á sjálfa sig, býðst henni óvænt skjól hjá sérvitringnum frænda sínum í lítilli fornbókabúð í Tókýó. Jimbocho-hverfið iðar af lífi, ágeng kryddangan er í loftinu og neonljós borgarinnar flökta stöðugt en í Morisaki-bókabúðinni opnast annar heimur – kyrrlátur, hlýr og fullur af sögum. Þar hefst heillandi ferðalag sem á eftir að umbreyta lífi Takako.
Dagar mínir í Morisaki-bókabúðinni er seiðandi saga um vináttu sem sprettur á ólíklegustu stöðum, sérkennilega fastagesti og ómótstæðilega japanska menningu.
Satoshi Yagisawa hlaut verðskuldaða athygli fyrir þessa hrífandi sögu sem hefur komið út víða um heim og var kvikmynduð í Japan.
Strange Buildings
4.390 kr.The addictive mystery taking the world by storm, from the author of The Times Bestseller Strange Pictures
Eleven strange buildings. One terrible secret.
A lonely hut in the woods.
A hidden chamber.
A mysterious shrine.
A home in flames.
A nightmarish prison…
Each of the buildings in this book tells a chilling story. Each one is part of a puzzle.
Look closely… and you’ll see that everything is connected.
All leading to a revelation so horrifying you won’t want to believe it.
Millions of readers have become addicted to solving Uketsu’s dark mysteries.
Strange Buildings is the strangest, and darkest, so far.
The Setting Sun
3.690 kr.Set in the early postwar years, it probes the destructive effects of war and the transition from a feudal Japan to an industrial society. Ozamu Dazai died, a suicide, in 1948. But the influence of his book has made “people of the setting sun” a permanent part of the Japanese language, and his heroine, Kazuko, a young aristocrat who deliberately abandons her class, a symbol of the anomie which pervades so much of the modern world.
No Longer Human
3.690 kr.The poignant and fascinating story of a young man who is caught between the breakup of the traditions of a northern Japanese aristocratic family and the impact of Western ideas.
Portraying himself as a failure, the protagonist of Osamu Dazai’s No Longer Human narrates a seemingly normal life even while he feels himself incapable of understanding human beings. Oba Yozo’s attempts to reconcile himself to the world around him begin in early childhood, continue through high school, where he becomes a “clown” to mask his alienation, and eventually lead to a failed suicide attempt as an adult. Without sentimentality, he records the casual cruelties of life and its fleeting moments of human connection and tenderness.
Vanishing World
3.990 kr.“Normality is the creepiest madness there is…”
From the author of the bestselling literary sensations Convenience Store Woman and Earthlings comes a surprising and highly imaginative story set in a version of Japan where sex between married couples has vanished and all children are born by artificial insemination. Sayaka Murata has proven herself to be one of the most exciting chroniclers of the strangeness of society, x-raying our contemporary world to bizarre and troubling effect. Her depictions of a happily unmarried retail worker in Convenience Store Woman and a young woman convinced she is an alien in Earthlings have endeared her to millions of readers worldwide.
Vanishing World takes Murata’s universe to a bold new level, imagining an alternative Japan where attitudes to sex and procreation are wildly different to our own. As a girl, Amane realizes with horror that her parents “copulated” in order to bring her into the world, rather than using artificial insemination, which became the norm in the mid-twentieth century. Amane strives to get away from what she considers an indoctrination in this strange “system” by her mother, but her infatuations with both anime characters and real people have a sexual force that is undeniable.
As an adult in an appropriately sexless marriage-sex between married couples is now considered as taboo as incest-Amane and her husband Saku decide to go and live in a mysterious new town called Experiment City or Paradise-Eden, where all children are raised communally, and every person is considered a Mother to all children. Men are beginning to become pregnant using artificial wombs that sit outside of their bodies like balloons, and children are nameless, called only “Kodomo-chan.” Is this the new world that will purify Amane of her strangeness once and for all?
Under the Eye of the Big Bird
3.490 kr.In the distant future, humans are on the verge of extinction and have settled in small tribes across the planet under the observation and care of the Mothers. Some children are made in factories, from cells of rabbits and dolphins; some live by getting nutrients from water and light, like plants. The survival of the race depends on the interbreeding of these and other alien beings – but it is far from certain that connection, love, reproduction, and evolution will persist among the inhabitants of this faltering new world.
Unfolding over geological eons, Under the Eye of the Big Bird is at once an astonishing vision of the end of our species as we know it and a meditation on the qualities that, for better and worse, make us human.
Super-Frog Saves Tokyo
4.390 kr.A lavishly illustrated edition of Murakami’s classic short story. Katagiri found a giant frog waiting for him in his apartment. It was powerfully built, standing over six feet tall on its hind legs.
A skinny little man no more than five foot three, Katagiri was overwhelmed by the frog’s imposing bulk. ‘Call me “Frog,”’ said the frog in a clear, strong voice. Fully illustrated and beautifully designed, this special edition of Murakami’s celebrated short story sees the bewildered Katagiri find meaning in his humdrum life through joining forces with Frog in an effort to save Tokyo from an existential threat.
Vaxtarræktarkonan einmana
4.390 kr.Frumlegar smásögur úr japönskum samtíma sem fjalla um tengsl og samskipti á óvæntan hátt. Sögupersónurnar takast á við hið gróteska, framandi og ævintýralega í hversdeginum og frelsast úr viðjum vanans.
Yukiko Motoya (f. 1979) er ein ferskasta rödd japanskra samtímabókmennta. Hún skrifar skáldverk og leikrit og stýrir eigin leikfélagi, auk þess sem gerðar hafa verið kvikmyndir eftir verkum hennar. Motoya hefur unnið til virtra bókmennta- og leiklistarverðlauna í heimalandi sínu.
Strange Houses
4.390 kr.A sinister hidden room. A dead space between two walls. A sealed cellar.
A child’s face glimpsed at a window. Every house hides secrets. But some secrets are far darker than others.
More than a million readers have discovered the terrible truth behind these strange houses. Now it’s your turn.
Butter
3.490 kr.Gourmet cook Manako Kajii sits in Tokyo Detention Centre convicted of the serial murders of lonely businessmen, who she is said to have seduced with her delicious home cooking. The case has captured the nation’s imagination but Kajii refuses to speak with the press. That is, until journalist Rika Machida writes a letter asking for her recipe for beef stew and Kajii can’t resist writing back.
Rika, the only woman in her news office, works late each night, rarely cooking more than ramen. As the visits unfold between her and the steely Kajii, they are closer to a masterclass in food than journalistic research. Rika hopes this gastronomic exchange will help her soften Kajii but it seems that she might be the one changing. With each meal she eats, something is awakening in her body. Might she and Kaji have more in common than she once thought?
Inspired by the real case of the convicted con woman and serial killer, ‘The Konkatsu Killer’, Asako Yuzuki’s Butter is a vivid, gripping exploration of misogyny, obsession and the transgressive pleasures of food in Japan.