After the Banquet

After the Banquet
Yukio Mishima
ISBN 009928278X

Kazu runs her restaurant with charm and shrewdness, but when she falls in love with one of her clients, she renounces her business to become his wife. When Kazu decides to ressurect her husbands political career she is forced to choose between her marriage and her irrepressible vitality.

The Waiting Years

The Waiting Years
Fumiko Enchi, John Bester (Translator)
ISBN 477002889X

The beautiful, immature girl whom she took home to her husband was a maid only in name. Tomo's real mission had been to find him a mistress. Nor did her secret humiliation end there. The web that his insatiable lust spun about him soon trapped another young woman, and another ... and the relationships between the women thus caught were to form, over the years, a subtle, shifting pattern in which they all played a part. There was Suga, the innocent, introspective girl from a respectable but impoverished family; the outgoing, cheerful, almost boyish Yumi; the flirtatious, seductive Miya, who soon found her father-in-law more dependable as a man than his brutish son.... And at the center, rejected yet dominating them all, the near tragic figure of the wife Tomo, whose passionate heart was always, until that final day, held in check by an old-fashioned code.
In a series of colorful, unforgettable scenes, Enchi brilliantly handles the human interplay within the ill-fated Shirakawa family. Japan's leading woman novelist and a member of the prestigious Art Academy, she combines a graceful, evocative style that consciously echoes the Tale of Genji with keen insight and an impressive ability to develop her characters over a long period of time. Her work is rooted deep in the female psychology, and it is her women above all-so clearly differentiated yet all so utterly feminine-who live in the memory. With The Waiting Years, a new and important literary figure makes her debut in the Western world.

The Wild Geese

The Wild Geese
Mori Ōgai
ISBN 0804810702


The Wild Geese, prominent Japanese novelist Ogai Mori offers a poignant story of unfulfilled love, set against the background of the dizzying social change accompanying the fall of the Meiji regime. The young heroine, Otama, is forced by poverty to become a moneylender's mistress. She is surrounded by skillfully-drawn characters—her weak-willed father, her virile and calculating lover (and his suspicious wife), and the handsome student who is both the object of her desire, and the symbol of her rescue—as well as a colorful procession of Meiji era figures—geisha, students, entertainers, unscrupulous matchmakers, shopkeepers, and greedy landladies.

Like those around her, and like the wild geese of the title, Otama yearns for the freedom of flight. Her dawning consciousness of her predicament brings the novel to a touching climax.

Written in 1913, The Wild Geese enjoyed such success in Japan that it was made into a film, shown abroad as The Mistress.

The Old Capital

The Old Capital
Yasunari Kawabata, J. Martin Holman (Translator)
ISBN 1593760329

The Old Capital is one of the three novels cited specifically by the Nobel Committee when they awarded Kawabata the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1968. With the ethereal tone and aesthetic styling characteristic of Kawabata's prose, The Old Capital tells the story of Chieko, the adopted daughter of a Kyoto kimono designer, Takichiro, and his wife, Shige.

Set in the traditional city of Kyoto, Japan, this deeply poetic story revolves around Chieko who becomes bewildered and troubled as she discovers the true facets of her past. With the harmony and time-honored customs of a Japanese backdrop, the story becomes poignant as Chieko s longing and confusion develops.

The Kappa Child

The Kappa Child
Hiromi Goto
ISBN 0889952280

< From the award-winning author of Chorus of Mushrooms, which won the Commonwealth Writers' Prize for Best First Book in the Caribbean and Canadian Region and was co-winner of the Canada Japan Book Award, The Kappa Child is the tale of four Japanese Canadian sisters struggling to escape the bonds of a family and landscape as inhospitable as the sweltering prairie heat.

In a family not at all reminiscent of Laura Ingalls Wilder's Little House on the Prairie, four Japanese-Canadian sisters struggle to escape the bonds of a family and landscape as inhospitable as the sweltering prairie heat. Their father, moved by an incredible dream of optimism, decides to migrate from the lush green fields of British Columbia to Alberta. There, he is determined to deny the hard-pan limitations of the prairie and to grow rice. Despite a dearth of both water and love, the family discovers, through sorrow and fear, the green kiss of the Kappa Child, a mythical creature who blesses those who can imagine its magic...

The Street of a Thousand Blossoms

The Street of a Thousand Blossoms
Gail Tsukiyama
ISBN 0312274823

It is Tokyo in 1939. On the Street of a Thousand Blossoms, two orphaned brothers are growing up with their loving grandparents, who inspire them to dream of a future firmly rooted in tradition. The older boy, Hiroshi, shows unusual skill at the national obsession of sumo wrestling, while Kenji is fascinated by the art of creating hard-carved masks for actors in the Noh theater.
Across town, a renowned sumo master, Sho Tanaka, lives with his wife and their two young daughters: the delicate, daydreaming Aki and her independent sister, Haru. Life seems full of promise as Kenji begins an informal apprenticeship with the most famous mask-maker in Japan and Hiroshi receives a coveted invitation to train with Tanaka. But then Pearl Harbor changes everything. As the ripples of war spread to both families' quiet neighborhoods, all of the generations must put their dreams on hold---and then find their way in a new Japan.
In an exquisitely moving story that spans almost thirty years, Gail Tsukiyama draws us irresistibly into the world of the brothers and the women who love them. It is a world of tradition and change, of heartbreaking loss and surprising hope, and of the impact of events beyond their control on ordinary, decent men and women. Above all, The Street of a Thousand Blossoms is a masterpiece about love and family from a glorious storyteller at the height of her powers.

Behold the Many: A Novel

Behold the Many: A Novel
Lois-Ann Yamanaka
ISBN 0312426542

Taking up her familiar themes—family, guilt, abandonment and the curses invoked by the dead on the living—Yamanaka's latest novel builds nicely on her previous, Father of the Four Passages. In 1913, sisters Anah, Aki and Leah are sent to an orphanage on the Hawaiian island of Oahu when they fall ill with tuberculosis. Their family, headed by their hard-drinking Portuguese father who abuses their Japanese mother, is already strained before their departure. Anah promises her sisters that their mother and brother, Charles, will rescue them from the orphanage, but she is wrong: Leah and Aki die. As vengeful ghosts, Anah's sisters taunt and torture her for surviving and for what Aki terms her "lie" to them. With their parents' deaths and the disappearance of Charles, Anah remains cursed even as she attempts to go on. When Anah eventually finds happiness and marries, the chorus of voices from the dead extends the curse to her children. Only many years later—following much suffering and one horrifying event—does Anah find a way to appease the ghosts and to forgive herself. A cacophony of voices both living and dead who speak a variety of Hawaiian dialects spikes the narrative, but Yamanaka's beautiful, harsh prose and thematic vision unify this intense novel. (Feb.)
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The Makioka Sisters

The Makioka Sisters 
Junichiro Tanizaki, Edward G. Seidensticker (Translator)
ISBN 0679761640

In Osaka in the years immediately before World War II, four aristocratic women try to preserve a way of life that is vanishing. As told by Junichiro Tanizaki, the story of the Makioka sisters forms what is arguably the greatest Japanese novel of the twentieth century, a poignant yet unsparing portrait of a family–and an entire society–sliding into the abyss of modernity.

Tsuruko, the eldest sister, clings obstinately to the prestige of her family name even as her husband prepares to move their household to Tokyo, where that name means nothing. Sachiko compromises valiantly to secure the future of her younger sisters. The unmarried Yukiko is a hostage to her family’s exacting standards, while the spirited Taeko rebels by flinging herself into scandalous romantic alliances. Filled with vignettes of upper-class Japanese life and capturing both the decorum and the heartache of its protagonist, The Makioka Sisters is a classic of international literature.

All She Was Worth

All She Was Worth
Miyuki Miyabe, Alfred Birnbaum (Translator)
ISBN 0395966582

Here is a deftly written thriller that is also a "deep and moody" (NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW) journey through the dark side of Japan's consumer-crazed society. Ordinary people plunge into insurmountable personal debt and fall prey to dangerous webs of underground creditors-so dangerous, in fact, that murder may be the only way out. A beautiful young woman vanishes, and the detective quickly finds she was not whom she had claimed to be. Is she a victim, a killer, or both? In a country that tracks its citizens at every turn, how can two women claim the same identity and then disappear without a trace?

Sanshiro

Sanshiro
Natsume Sōseki
ISBN 1929280106

One of Soseki's most beloved works of fiction, the novel depicts the 23-year-old Sanshiro leaving the sleepy countryside for the first time in his life to experience the constantly moving 'real world' of Tokyo, its women and university. In the subtle tension between our appreciation of Soseki's lively humour and our awareness of Sanshiro's doomed innocence, the novel comes to life. Sanshiro is also penetrating social and cultural commentary.

The Devotion of Suspect X

The Devotion of Suspect X 
Keigo Higashino, Alexander O. Smith (Translator)
ISBN 0312375069

Yasuko Hanaoka is a divorced, single mother who thought she had finally escaped her abusive ex-husband Togashi. When he shows up one day to extort money from her, threatening both her and her teenaged daughter Misato, the situation quickly escalates into violence and Togashi ends up dead on her apartment floor. Overhearing the commotion, Yasuko’s next door neighbor, middle-aged high school mathematics teacher Ishigami, offers his help, disposing not only of the body but plotting the cover-up step-by-step.

When the body turns up and is identified, Detective Kusanagi draws the case and Yasuko comes under suspicion. Kusanagi is unable to find any obvious holes in Yasuko’s manufactured alibi and yet is still sure that there’s something wrong. Kusanagi brings in Dr. Manabu Yukawa, a physicist and college friend who frequently consults with the police. Yukawa, known to the police by the nickname Professor Galileo, went to college with Ishigami. After meeting up with him again, Yukawa is convinced that Ishigami had something to do with the murder. What ensues is a high level battle of wits, as Ishigami tries to protect Yasuko by outmaneuvering and outthinking Yukawa, who faces his most clever and determined opponent yet.

The Tale of Murasaki: A Novel

The Tale of Murasaki: A Novel
Liza Dalby
ISBN 0385497954

In the eleventh century Murasaki Shikibu wrote the world’s first novel,The Tale of Genji, the most popular work in the history of Japanese literature. In The Tale of Murasaki, Liza Dalby has created a breathtaking fictionalized narrative of the life of this timeless poet–a lonely girl who becomes such a compelling storyteller that she is invited to regale the empress with her tales. The Tale of Murasaki is the story of an enchanting time and an exotic place. Whether writing about mystical rice fields in the rainy mountains or the politics and intrigue of the royal court, Dalby breathes astonishing life into ancient Japan.

Out

Out
Natsuo Kirino
ISBN 1400078377

With volcanic urgency, Kirino's story erupts onto the page with a searing heat, flowing like lava to a remarkable finish. Facing the daily burdens of slavish work conditions, stale marriages, and a society refusing to show them a proper respect, the women on the nightshift at a suburban Tokyo factory are all looking for one thing -- a way out. When pretty young Yayoi takes a beating from her deadbeat husband, her coworkers do little more than help their friend keep pace with the line. But a new kind of sisterhood emerges when Yayoi requires assistance in disposing of her dead husband's body.

Masako Katori emerges as a tenaciously determined leader in the dangerous cover-up, and with the others, provides readers with a disturbing vision of the lengths a human mind will travel in its quest for freedom. For Kirino's women aren't ruthless murderers; they're hardworking housewives with dignity, desperate for respect.

Confessions of a Mask

Confessions of a Mask
Yukio Mishima
ISBN 0720610311

Confessions of a Mask is the story of an adolescent who must learn to live with the painful fact that he is unlike other young men. Mishima's protagonist discovers that he is becoming a homosexual in polite, post-war Japan. To survive, he must live behind a mask of propriety.

The Girl Who Played Go

The Girl Who Played Go
Shan Sa
ISBN 1400032288

As the Japanese military invades 1930s Manchuria, a young girl approaches her own sexual coming of age. Drawn into a complex triangle with two boys, she distracts herself from the onslaught of adulthood by playing the game of go with strangers in a public square--and yet the force of desire, like the occupation, proves inevitable. Unbeknownst to the girl who plays go, her most worthy and frequent opponent is a Japanese soldier in disguise. Captivated by her beauty as much as by her bold, unpredictable approach to the strategy game, the soldier finds his loyalties challenged. Is there room on the path to war for that most revolutionary of acts: falling in love?

Comfort Woman

Comfort Woman
Nora Okja Keller
ISBN 0140263357

"On the fifth anniversary of my father's death, my mother confessed to his murder." Thus begins Nora Okja Keller's breathtaking first novel, which follows Beccah, a young Korean-American girl growing up in Hawaii, as she uncovers the secret of her mother's past. Completely ignorant of her mother Akiko's history - she was sold into prostitution in the Japanese "recreation camps" of World War II for her oldest sister's dowry - Beccah understands that her mother lives in a spirit world she cannot share, and that clearly marks her as "other." Narrated in two voices, Beccah's and Akiko's, Keller reveals the story of Akiko's extraordinary dislocation - the slavery of the camps, the death of her first child, her unhappy marriage to an American missionary - which Beccah understands only after her mother's death. In language that is both harsh and lyrical, Keller explores the universally complicated relationship between mother and daughter. She shows us both Akiko's way of survival, sustained by her remarkable strength and her love for her daughter, and Beccah's acceptance of her mother and her own place in a world her mother no longer physically inhabits.

Norwegian Wood

Norwegian Wood
Haruki Murakami
ISBN 0375704027

Toru, a quiet and preternaturally serious young college student in Tokyo, is devoted to Naoko, a beautiful and introspective young woman, but their mutual passion is marked by the tragic death of their best friend years before.  Toru begins to adapt to campus life and the loneliness and isolation he faces there, but Naoko finds the pressures and responsibilities of life unbearable.  As she retreats further into her own world, Toru finds himself reaching out to others and drawn to a fiercely independent and sexually liberated young woman.

Be With You

Be With You
Takuji Ichikawa
ISBN 1421513935

When Takumi's wife suddenly returns from the grave, he can't believe his eyes. How could such a thing be possible? Is she here to stay? Has love miraculously triumphed over death? As Takumi starts looking for answers to these questions, he discovers the secret of his wife's appearance is somehow linked to the past...and the future.

No Longer Human

No Longer Human
Osamu Dazai
ISBN 0811204812

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.

Kitchen

Kitchen
Banana Yoshimoto
ISBN 0802142443

Banana Yoshimoto's Kitchen is an enchantingly original and deeply affecting book that juxtaposes two tales about mothers, transsexuality, kitchens, love, tragedy, and the terms they all come to in the minds of a pair of free-spirited young women in contemporary Japan. Told in a whimsical style that recalls the early Marguerite Duras, "Kitchen" and its companion story, "Moonlight Shadow," are elegant tales whose seeming simplicity is the ruse of a masterful storyteller. They are the work of a very special new writer whose voice echoes in the mind and the soul.