From the best-selling author of Strange Weather in Tokyo and The Nakano Thrift Shop, an irresistible reissue of her novel about an elusive ladies' man and the women who have loved him.
Over the course of his life, Mr Nishino falls hopelessly in love again and again. One woman is a colleague, another a chance encounter; one is the girlfriend of a classmate, another the best friend of Nishino's latest conquest. Some are entranced by Nishino, others care more for their freedom, their children - or their cats.
As we come to learn of the torments, desires and delights of each woman, a portrait emerges of a complicated man whose great capacity for love may well be the cause of his downfall.
'Charming... beguiling and beautiful' - Times
'Quirky and delicate...timeless...I fell totally under the spell of this beautiful book' - Daily Mail
'Arresting... a wonderful sleight-of-hand narrative that reveals so much while seemingly being very simple' - Big Issue
'[A] short, sharp novel... The author's minimal and restrained style perfectly suits her subtle way of questioning human perception... Beautiful' - Monocle
Born in 1958 in Tokyo, HIROMI KAWAKAMI is one of Japan's most popular contemporary novelists, famous for her literary, off-beat fiction. She is the author of The Nakano Thrift Shop and Strange Weather in Tokyo, which was shortlisted for the Independent Foreign Fiction Prize.
ALLISON MARKIN POWELL's translations include works by Osamu Dazai, Fuminori Nakamura, and Kanako Nishi. She was the guest editor for the first Japan issue of Words Without Borders and she maintains the database, Japanese Literature in English, at
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