(tent) A Town That’s Far No Matter Where You Start From

“My life wasn’t something to throw away after all,” says one of the characters in this quietly extraordinary collection of linked short stories. A fishmonger run by two men who share a strangely close bond. A “typical” housewife and her mother-in-law sipping tea at midnight. A grade-school girl observing her parents’ crumbling relationship. A dead fishmonger’s wife, remembered for running barefoot to her lover. Set in a small Tokyo neighborhood and its aging shopping street, these interconnected stories gently unravel the unease and fragile joy woven into the fabric of ordinary life. With subtlety, warmth, and a touch of melancholy, Hiromi Kawakami paints a deeply human portrait of people who live on the edges of change—revealing the very essence of her literary world.