Books from Japan
131 popular japanese books
Travel the world without leaving your chair.
The target of the Read Around The World Challenge is to read at least one book written by an author from each and every country in the world.
All books that are listed here as part of the "Read Around Asia Challenge" were written by authors from Japan.
Find a great book for the next part of your reading journey around the world from this book list. The following popular books have been recommended so far.
101.
The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up: The Japanese Art of Decluttering and Organizing by Marie Kondo EN
Description:
A #1 New York Times BestsellerAn Amazon Best Book of 2014 in Crafts, Home & GardenThis #1 New York Times bestselling guide to decluttering your home from Japanese cleaning consultant Marie Kondo takes readers step-by-step through her revolutionary KonMari Method for simplifying, organizing, and storing.
102.
The Liminal Zone by Junji Ito EN
Description:
Three-time Eisner Award winner Junji Ito presents brand-new nightmares! What destiny awaits them after the screaming? After abruptly departing from a train in a small town, a couple encounters a “weeping woman”—a professional mourner—sobbing inconsolably at a funeral. Mako changes afterward—she can’t stop crying! In another tale, having decided to die together, a couple enters Aokigahara, the infamous suicide forest. What is the shocking torrent they discover there? One of horror’s greatest talents, Junji Ito beckons readers to join him in an experience of ultimate terror with four new stories... continue
103.
The Lonesome Bodybuilder: Stories by Yukiko Motoya EN
Description:
Winner of the Akutagawa Prize and the Kenzaburo Oe Prize, these eleven surreal tales, set in the offices, zoos, bus stops, boutiques, and homes of contemporary Japan "are reminiscent, at least to this reader, of Joy Williams and Rivka Galchen and George Saunders" (Weike Wang, The New York Times Book Review, Editors' Choice). In the English-language debut of one of Japan’s most fearlessly inventive young writers a housewife takes up bodybuilding and sees radical changes to her physique, which her workaholic husband fails to notice. A boy waits at a bus stop, mocking commuters struggling to keep... continue
104.
The Makioka Sisters : Vintage Classics Japanese Series by JUNICHIRO. TANIZAKI EN
Description:
'An exquisite novel about four sisters living though a turbulent decade...I'd put it in the 10 greatest books of the 20th century' David Mitchell 'A near-perfect novel' Hanya Yanagihara In the years leading up to the Second World War, four sisters live in dilapidated houses in Osaka and Ashiya, and each navigate their own complex, personal relationship to the fading lustre of the Makioka family name. Rich with breathtaking descriptions of ancient customs and an ever-changing natural world, Junichiro Tanizaki evokes in loving detail a long-lost way of life even as it withers under the harsh gla... continue
105.
The Memory Police by Yoko Ogawa EN
Description:
Shortlisted for the International Booker Prize 2020, an enthralling Orwellian novel about the terrors of state surveillance from one of Japan's greatest writers. 'Beautiful... Haunting' Sunday Times 'A dreamlike story of dystopia' Jia Tolentino __________ Hat, ribbon, bird rose. To the people on the island, a disappeared thing no longer has any meaning. It can be burned in the garden, thrown in the river or handed over to the Memory Police. Soon enough, the island forgets it ever existed. When a young novelist discovers that her editor is in danger of being taken away by the Memory Police, she... continue
106.
The Nakano Thrift Shop by Hiromi Kawakami EN
Description:
From the author of Strange Weather in Tokyo comes this funny, heartwarming story about love, life, and human relationships that features a delightfully offbeat cast of characters. Objects for sale at the Nakano Thrift Shop appear as commonplace as the staff and customers that handle them. But like those same customers and staff, they hold many secrets. If examined carefully, they show the signs of innumerable extravagancies, of immeasurable pleasure and pain, and of the deep mysteries of the human heart. Hitomi, the inexperienced young woman who works the register at Mr. Nakano's thrift shop, ... continue
107.
The Night Is Short, Walk on Girl by Tomihiko Morimi EN
Description:
A college student spends an evening out, unwittingly attracting the attention of various men whose paths she crosses. One in particular, an upperclassman who has been nursing a crush on her for some time, has chosen this night to make his true feelings known. Will the two come together, or will this girl just keep on walking...?
108.
The Penguin Book of Japanese Short Stories by Jun'ichirō Tanizaki EN
Description:
A major new collection of Japanese short stories, many appearing in English for the first time, with an introduction by Haruki Murakami, author of Killing Commendatore A Penguin Classics Hardcover This fantastically varied and exciting collection celebrates the art of the Japanese short story, from its origins in the nineteenth century to the remarkable practitioners writing today. Edited by acclaimed translator Jay Rubin, who has himself freshly translated some of the stories, and with an introduction by Haruki Murakami, this book is a revelation. Stories by writers already well known to Engl... continue
109.
The Poems of Nakahara Chūya by Chuya Nakahara EN
Description:
Acclaimed English translation of poems by one of the most gifted and colourful of Japan's early modern poets: Nakahara Chuya. Now ranked among the finest Japanese verse of the 20th century, influenced by both Symbolism and Dada, he created lyrics renowned for their songlike eloquence, their personal imagery and their poignant charm.
110.
The Remains of the Day by Kazuo Ishiguro EN
Description:
BOOKER PRIZE WINNER • From the winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature, here is “an intricate and dazzling novel” (The New York Times) about the perfect butler and his fading, insular world in post-World War II England. This is Kazuo Ishiguro's profoundly compelling portrait of a butler named Stevens. Stevens, at the end of three decades of service at Darlington Hall, spending a day on a country drive, embarks as well on a journey through the past in an effort to reassure himself that he has served humanity by serving the "great gentleman," Lord Darlington. But lurking in his memory are doubts... continue