Asian Literature

Ten tales of loss and longing, from one one Japan's greatest writers It was the height of summer, and there was anger in the rays of the sun A summer holiday that turns to tragedy; a moonlit journey to fulfil a wish; a couple’s unusual way of...

*OVER ONE MILLION COPIES SOLD**NOW AN INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLER*If you could go back, who would you want to meet?In a small back alley of Tokyo, there is a café that has been serving carefully brewed coffee for more than one hundred years. Local...

A runaway teen and an ageing cat whisperer collide in this fabulist extravaganza that showcases all of Murakami’s philosophical playfulness and surreal exuberance. Kafka on the Shore effortlessly siphons the legacy of magic realism into...

From the #1 bestselling author in Japan comes a celebration of books, cats, and the people who love them, infused with the heartwarming spirit of The Guest Cat and The Travelling Cat Chronicles. Bookish high school student Rintaro Natsuki...

In the seaside city of Kamakura, a student is drawn to an enigmatic older man who swims at the same beach. The man becomes his Sensei. Against a backdrop of the rapid modernisation of Japan, their relationship endures - until one day, the young man...

Gwangju, South Korea, 1980. In the wake of a viciously suppressed student uprising, a boy searches for his friend's corpse, a consciousness searches for its abandoned body, and a brutalised country searches for a voice. In a sequence of interconnected...

A beautifully moving tale of loss and reaching out to the ones we love, of one man's journey to discover what really matters in modern life.Our narrator's days are numbered. Estranged from his family, living alone with only his cat Cabbage for company,...

You've just passed someone on the street who could be the love of your life, the person you're destined for - what do you do? In Murakami's world, you tell them a story. The five weird and wonderful tales collected here each unlock the many-tongued...

Translated from the Japanese bestseller, this charming and magical novel, inspired by the myth of cats returning favors to those who care for them, reminds us that it's never too late to follow our stars.In Japan, cats are a symbol of good luck. As the...

“One of our major novelists” (Salman Rushdie) tells the story of a woman reflecting on her uncompromising life, and the life of a former lover, in this provocative novel.“Yiyun Li is one of my favorite writers, and Must I...

The surprise hit of the summer and winner of Japan's prestigious Akutagawa Prize, Convenience Store Woman is the incomparable story of Keiko Furukura, a thirty-six-year-old Tokyo resident who has been working at the Hiiromachi "Smile Mart" for the past...

Translated from the Japanese bestseller that was adapted into a popular television series, seven struggling customers take up the unique opportunity to adopt a blanket cat . . . but only for three days, the time it’ll take for their lives to...

An instant bestseller in Korea and the follow up to the international bestseller, Please Look After Mom; centering on a woman’s efforts to reconnect with her aging father, uncovering long-held family secrets.Two years after losing her daughter in a...

Perfect reading for all fans of Before the Coffee Gets Cold, Tsujimura's whimsical magic realist novel introduces an unlikely medium who can bring the dead back to life for just one night and a quartet of his clients looking for closure and resolution...

"Utterly charming, particularly so for cat-lovers, who might argue that every bit of magic here is absolutely true." —Booklist (starred review). In this whimsical and inventive debut—perfect for fans of The Guest Cat and Calvino’s...

The third novel in the international bestselling Before the Coffee Gets Cold series, following four new customers in a cafe where customers can travel back in time.On the hillside of Mount Hakodate in northern Japan, Cafe Donna Donna is fabled for its...

Each morning, the Professor and the Housekeeper are introduced to one another. The Professor may not remember what he had for breakfast, but his mind is still alive with elegant mathematical equations from the past. He devises clever maths riddles -...

(Available after 3-20 days) A book that “speak[s] volumes about our need for connection—human, feline or otherwise” (The San Francisco Chronicle), The Travelling Cat Chronicles is a life-affirming anthem to kindness and self-sacrifice that shows how the...

A New York Times 'Notable Book of 2020' and one of Elena Ferrante's 'Top 40 Books by Female Authors'On a hot summer's day in a poor suburb of Tokyo we meet three women: thirty-year-old Natsuko, her older sister Makiko, and Makiko's teenage...

A hugely enjoyable, page-turning murder mystery with one of the best and most-satisfying conclusions you'll ever read: clever enough that you're unlikely to guess it, but simple enough that you'll kick yourself when it's revealed. That's what has made it...