The opening ceremony for the 2020 Olympic Games will be held tomorrow in Tokyo, Japan. We may not be able to physically travel to Japan right now, but we can armchair travel there through one of these books set in Tokyo.
Before the Coffee Gets Cold by Toshikazu Kawaguchi (272 pages; 2020). In a small back alley in Tokyo at a century-old coffee shop rumored to offer patrons the chance to travel back in time, four customers reevaluate their formative life choices.
Convenience Store Woman by Sayaka Murata (163 pages; 2018). Keiko Furukura had always been considered a strange child, and her parents always worried how she would get on in the real world, so when she takes on a job in a convenience store while at university, they are delighted for her. However, eighteen years later, at age 36, she is still in the same job, has never had a boyfriend, and has only few friends. When a similarly alienated but cynical and bitter young man comes to work in the store, he will upset Keiko’s contented stasis–but will it be for the better?
Newcomer by Keigo Higashino (342 pages; 2018). Detective Kyochiro Kaga of the Tokyo Police Department has just been transferred to a new precinct in the Nihonbashi area of Tokyo. Newly arrived, but with a great deal of experience, Kaga is promptly assigned to the team investigating the murder of a woman. But the more he investigates, the greater number of potential suspects emerges.
The Silent Dead by Tetsuya Honda (292 pages; 2016). When a body wrapped in a blue plastic tarp and tied up with twine is discovered near the bushes near a quiet suburban Tokyo neighborhood, Lt. Reiko Himekawa and her squad take the case. But while she is hunting the killer, the killer is hunting her… and she may very well have been marked as the next victim.
The Ten Loves of Nishino by Hiromi Kawakami (172 pages; 2019). Hiromi Kawakami tells the story of an enigmatic man through the voices of ten remarkable women who have known him. Each woman has succombed, even if only for an hour, to the seductive, imprudent, and furtively feline man who drifted so naturally into their lives. Still clinging to the vivid memory of his warm breath and his indeciperhable silences, ten women tell their stories as they attempt to recreate the image of the unfathomable Nishino.
Tokyo Ever After by Emiko Jean (322 pages; 2021). After learning that her father is the Crown Prince of Japan, Izumi travels to Tokyo, where she discovers that Japanese imperial life–complete with designer clothes, court intrigue, paparazzi scandals, and a forbidden romance with her handsome but stoic bodyguard–is a tough fit for the outspoken and irreverant eighteen-year-old from northern California.
