Open Books Challenge 2025: Books Set in Japan or by a Japanese AuthorUnpublished

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The untold story of how Japan became a cultural superpower through the fantastic inventions that captured--and transformed--the world's imagination.   "A masterful book driven by deep research, new insights, and powerful storytelling."--W. David Marx, author of ...

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 smallest things can provide the...

A classic Japanese murder mystery inspired by the golden age of British crimewriting.

From the best-selling author of The Elegance of the Hedgehog comes a story about a woman's journey to discover the father she never knew and a love she never thought possible.   Rose has just turned forty when she gets a call from a lawyer asking her to come to Kyoto for the reading...

SOON TO BE AN FX LIMITED SERIES * A bold English adventurer. An invincible Japanese warlord. A beautiful woman torn between two ways of life. All brought together in an extraordinary saga aflame with passion, conflict, ambition, and the struggle for power. ...

BEST OF THE YEAR: Chicago Public Library · Kids' Indie Next List A story of multigenerational pain, magic, and the lengths to which we'll go to protect the people we love. Kohei Fujiwara has never seen a big ryu&...

For centuries, the Samurai dominated Japan. Although they have disappeared, their values--honor, loyalty, and bravery-continue to influence Japanese thought today. Where did these fierce warriors come from? How did they achieve such power? This engrossing history recounts the Samurai's foundation...

Mine has been a life of much shame. I can't even guess myself what it must be to live the life of a human being. 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....

Haruki Murakami's stories in graphic novel form for the first time! Haruki Murakami's novels, essays and short stories have sold millions of copies worldwide and been translated into dozens of languages. Now for the first time, many of Murakami's best-loved short stories are...

In the spirit of A Place to Belong, this remarkable novel-in-verse examines the aftershocks of the earthquake and tsunami that devastated Japan in 2011 through the eyes of a young girl who learns that even the smallest kindness can make a difference. March 11, 2011 ...

A geeky girl whose life revolves around yaoi manga and a quiet gamer boy are old friends, but when they start working in the same office, they decide to date. It's a relationship of convenience at first, but could it become something more? This manga comedy is now a hit streaming anime!

From the acclaimed international bestseller Keigo Higashino (The Devotion of Suspect X) comes a sweeping novel in the tradition of Les Miserables and Crime and Punishment. This is the compelling story of a brutal crime and the two teenagers--Ryo, the son of the murdered man,...

From first crush to first crushed! The autobiographical manga about one woman's quest for the hot short-haired girlfriend of her dreams! The autobiographical manga about one woman's quest for the hot, short-haired girlfriend of her dreams! Mieri is an awkward,...

The Heartbeat Library is a tender, contemplative, and uplifting novel about grief, friendship, and the many ways we heal, by the internationally bestselling author of The Phone Booth at the Edge of the World. On the peaceful Japanese island of Teshima...

**2017 Creative Child Magazine Preferred Choice Award Winner** **2017 Moonbeam Children's Book Award Gold Medal Winner** A book for comic lovers and Japanophiles of all ages, Diary of a Tokyo Teen presents a unique look at modern-day Japan through a young...

Emiko Jean's New York Times bestseller and Reese Book Club Pick Tokyo Ever After is the "refreshing, spot-on" (Booklist, starred review) story of an ordinary Japanese American girl who discovers that her father is the Crown Prince of Japan! Izumi Tanaka...

A Good Morning America Book Club Pick and New York Times Bestseller!   From debut author Asha Lemmie, "a lovely, heartrending story about love and loss, prejudice and pain, and the sometimes dangerous, always durable ties that link a family together." -...

Inspired by the Wind Telephone in Japan, this poignant story explores the stages of grief, the healing power of hope, and the unbreakable family bonds that connect us all. From the acclaimed author of The Invisible Boy and the award-winning illustrator of One. In a...

2012 Storytelling World Award Best Children's Books of the Year 2012, Bank Street College 2011 NYPL 100 Books for Reading and Sharing STARRED REVIEW! "The text is nicely repetitive and includes satisfyingly disgusting nose...

A New York Times BestsellerWinner of the Eisner for Best U.S. Edition of International Material--Asia From legendary animator Hayao Miyazaki comes Shuna's Journey, a new manga classic about a prince on a quest for a golden grain that would...

NATIONAL BESTSELLER * Translated from the Japanese bestseller, a charming and magical novel that reminds us it's never too late to follow our stars. "Mochizuki dazzles in her beautifully crafted contemporary fantasy debut. . . . This gentle fantasy is not to be missed."--...

*SHORTLISTED FOR THE PEN TRANSLATION PRIZE* An unfulfilled college student hurtles through four parallel realities to explore the what-might've-been and the what-should-never-be in this Groundhog Day meets The Midnight Library-esque novel from one of Japan's most popular authors. ...

Two detectives. Two identical women. One dead body-rapidly becoming two, then three, then four. All knotted up in Japan's underground BDSM scene and kinbaku, a form of rope bondage which bears a complex cultural history of spirituality, torture, cleansing, and sacrifice. As Togashi, a junior member...

THE NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW EDITORS' CHOICE * A TIME BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR * From the award-winning, psychologically astute author of The Memory Police, a hypnotic, introspective novel about an affluent Japanese family navigating buried secrets, and their young house guest...

"Cleverly written and laugh-out-loud funny, this infinitely re-readable picture book is ripe with social-emotional learning opportunities around misunderstanding, as well as serving as a warm welcome into Cuban culture" - Barnes & Noble Magaly loves the yummy Cuban...

"Each chapter of this enrapturing novel is elegantly brief and charged with barely contained emotion." --New York Times Book Review A gripping debut set in modern-day Tokyo and inspired by a true crime, for readers of Everything I Never Told You and The Perfect Nanny...

From the award-winning author of Flygirl comes this powerful WWII romance between two Japanese teens caught in the cogs of an unwinnable war, perfect for fans of Salt to the Sea, Lovely War, and Code Name Verity. Japan 1945. Taro is a talented...

*Finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in Biography* *Winner of the 2020 National Book Critics Circle Award* *Winner of the PEN/Jacqueline Bograd Weld Award for Biography* A vivid, deeply researched work of history that explores the life of an unconventional woman...

NATIONAL BESTSELLER . "A fun, DaVinci Code-style blend of puzzles, mysticism and high-octane action" (People, Best Books of the Month), from the author of The Puzzle Master "This rip-roaring adventure thriller is an escapist puzzle box of delights- a...

INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLER!  A Studio Ghibli-esque work of Japanese translation "that lays bare the anxieties and desperation--and the small triumphs--of adolescence" (Locus), for fans of Mieko Kawakami's Heaven. Seven students find unusual common ground in...

60 years of observation: an American journalist's memoir about Tokyo's modern urban transformation, its criminal underworld and, oh yes, baseball. Tokyo Junkie is a memoir that plays out over the dramatic 60-year growth of the megacity Tokyo, once a dark, fetid backwater and now the...

A fiendish, classic locked room murder mystery, from one of Japan's greatest crime writers, that's perfect for fans of Lucy Foley and Ruth Ware "An exceptional whodunit... The brilliant and intricate plot will keep readers turning the pages."  --Publishers Weekly, starred...

"A beautiful translation . . . Yoshimoto deploys a magically Japanese light touch to emotionally and existentially tough subject matter: domestic disarray, loneliness, identity issues, lovesickness . . . [a] nimble narrative." ―ELLE In Moshi Moshi, Yoshie's...

INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLER The cult Japanese bestseller about a female gourmet cook and serial killer, and the journalist intent on cracking her case, inspired by a true story There are two things that I simply cannot tolerate: feminists and...