This million-selling novel follows the lengthy process of compiling a dictionary, bringing a genuine sense of drama to the lives of people who immerse themselves day after day in the constant flux of language. Mitsuo ...

Osamu Tokieda is in his third year at a college on the outskirts of Tokyo. He is revelling in the easy student life, spending time with his girlfriend and earning pocket money at a part-time job, when ...

Jumpei Sakamoto, 21, is a good-natured, bottom-rung foot soldier in a yakuza syndicate that claims the Kabukicho entertainment district near Tokyo’s Shinjuku Station as its territory. He can be quick ...

Natsuko Kotani has a knack for wrapping men around her little finger. She lies to them, she’s mean to them, and while she’s not even especially good looking, somehow they find their spirits ...

Shugo Machida, still a bachelor at 32, works for a food company. Three years ago his 60-year-old mother died of Parkinson’s disease; Shugo’s father—who never imagined that his stouthearted ...

Kyōko Umemoto is a slightly chubby 18-year-old-girl. Having recently graduated from high school, she remains undecided about what to do next with her life. Then one day she sees a “Help Wanted” sign ...

Hiromasa Hida was once one of Japan’s premier skiers, representing the country in international competitions; his daughter Kazami is also a skier. When Kazami was two, his wife—Kazami’s mother—committed ...

First-person narrator Kengo Katsuki relates his wife Michiru’s story, going back to events in her life before they met. The account begins when Michiru is 23 and working as a bookstore clerk in a ...

In a refrigerated container sitting on reclaimed land in the harbor district, 14 frozen corpses are found lying neatly in a row. The evidence seems to suggest that it is a mass suicide by sleeping pill, ...

After the collapse of modern civilization, most of our future planet’s surface is covered by water. The interactions of the surviving humans with Ichtyonaus and Thérionaus, peculiar creatures that ...

Takeshi Hongo, 34, is an investigator in the Internal Affairs section of the Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department. Formerly a private detective, he was taken on as an irregular hire by the MPD for his ...

Five former grade-school classmates who are now 40—three men and two women—are at a bar in Sapporo’s Susukino entertainment district following a class reunion. Tamura, a classmate who couldn’t ...

Ryo Himekawa is the guitarist in an amateur band formed 14 years earlier. The day he has an argument with his lover from high school days, her corpse is discovered in the studio where their band practices. ...

Shinsuke Amemura works as a bartender at the bar Myoga. One day as he is closing up, he is attacked by an unidentified man. Although he escapes with his life, he soon realizes that he suffers from partial ...

In this second installment of the author’s best-selling Reiko Himekawa series, a severed left hand is found in a minivan abandoned on a dry riverbed. Himekawa and her team join the investigation. ...

Having been a victim of rape in high school, Reiko Himekawa decides she wants to be a police detective, and joins the Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department upon graduation from college. Promoted with unusual ...

With barely 24 hours left before the statute of limitations will expire, the police receive an anonymous tip claiming that a death ruled a suicide 15 years ago was actually a murder. The body of Maiko ...

Workaholic Saeki is a 50-year-old marketing rep for an ad agency. He’s just won a lucrative new contract to promote the Internet startup GigaForce, his 24-year-old daughter is about to be married, ...

A novel in eight short stories featuring coroner Yoshio Kuraishi as the protagonist, written by the author of 64 (Six-Four), which was nominated for the 2016 CWA International Dagger award. At ...

Thirty-something creative whiz Shunsuke Sakuma, who works for an ad agency, is subjected to the greatest humiliation of his career when an event he has been planning for client Nissei Automotive is quashed ...