Join us

Facebook
Twitter
Instagram
Newsletter

Maki Kashimada

Touring the Land of the Dead (and Ninety-Nine Kisses)

Cover: Touring the Land of the Dead (and Ninety-Nine Kisses) - Maki Kashimada

Maki Kashimada

Touring the Land of the Dead (and Ninety-Nine Kisses)

2021, pp. 144, e-Book
ISBN: 9781609456528
Translated by: Haydn Trowell
Region: Japan
Paper edition Paper edition Paper edition
$ 12.99
READ NOW READ NOW READ NOW

The book

A story from one of Japan's rising literary stars about memory, loss, and love, Touring the Land of the Dead is a mesmerizing combination of two tales, both told with stylistic inventiveness and breathtaking sensitivity.

Taichi was forced to stop working almost a decade ago and since then he and his wife Natsuko have been getting by on her part-time wages. But Natsuko is a woman accustomed to hardship. When her own family's fortune dried up years during her childhood, she, her brother, and her mother lived a surreal hand-to-mouth existence shaped by her mother's refusal to accept their new station in life.

One day, Natsuko sees an ad for a spa and recognizes the place as the former luxury hotel that Natsuko's grandfather had taken her mother to when she was little. She decides to take her damaged husband to the spa, despite the cost, but their time there triggers hard but ultimately redemptive memories relating to the complicated history of her family and a reconciliation with her husband.

Modeled on Junichiro Tanizaki's classic story, The Makioka Sisters, Ninety-Nine Kisses is the second story in this book and it portrays in touching and lyrical fashion the lives of the four unmarried sisters in a historical, close-knit neighborhood of contemporary Tokyo.

The author

Maki Kashimada
Maki Kashimada’s first novel Two won the 1998 Bungei Prize. Since then, she has established herself as a writer of literary fiction and become known for her avant-garde style. In 2005 she received the Mishima Yukio Prize for Love at 6,000 Degrees Celsius, a novel set in Nagasaki and based on Hiroshima mon amour by Marguerite Duras, and in 2007 she took the Noma Prize for New Writers for Picardy Third. She was nominated three times for the Akutagawa Prize before ultimately garnering the award in 2012 with Touring the Land of the Dead. One of her best-known works is The Kingdom of Zero (2009), which reworks Dostoevsky's The Idiot into the tale of a saintly idiot in Japan. She has been a follower of the Japanese Orthodox Church since high school and was married to a member of its clergy.

Press

From the same country

  • Cover: Goodnight Tokyo - Atsuhiro Yoshida

    Atsuhiro Yoshida

    Goodnight Tokyo

    2024, pp. 176, $ 18.00
    A symphony of interconnected lives that offers a compelling reflection on life in modern-day metropolises at the intersection of isolation and intimacy.
  • Cover: All the Lovers in the Night - Mieko Kawakami

    Mieko Kawakami

    All the Lovers in the Night

    2023, pp. 224, $ 17.95
    Bestselling author of Breasts and Eggs Mieko Kawakami invites readers back into her immediately recognizable fictional world with this new, extraordinary...
  • Cover: Heaven - Mieko Kawakami

    Mieko Kawakami

    Heaven

    2022, pp. 176, $ 16.95
    Hailed as a bold foray into new literary territory, Kawakami’s novel is told in the voice of a 14-year-old student who subjected to relentless torment...
  • Cover: All the Lovers in the Night - Mieko Kawakami

    Mieko Kawakami

    All the Lovers in the Night

    2022, pp. 224, $ 28.00
    Bestselling author of Breasts and Eggs Mieko Kawakami invites readers back into her immediately recognizable fictional world with this new, extraordinary...
  • Cover: Heaven - Mieko Kawakami

    Mieko Kawakami

    Heaven

    2021, pp. 192, $ 23.00
    Hailed as a bold foray into new literary territory, Kawakami’s novel is told in the voice of a 14-year-old student who subjected to relentless torment...
  • Cover: Breasts and Eggs - Mieko Kawakami

    Mieko Kawakami

    Breasts and Eggs

    2021, pp. 432, $ 16.95
    “One of Japan’s brightest stars is set to explode across the global skies of literature.” —Japan Times

More suggestions

  • Cover: The Colony - Annika Norlin

    Annika Norlin

    The Colony

    2025, pp. 464, $ 19.00
    A mega best-seller in Sweden, with rights sold to over a dozen countries and a TV adaptation underway, Annika Norlin’s debut novel The Colony...
  • Cover: The Tokyo Suite - Giovana Madalosso

    Giovana Madalosso

    The Tokyo Suite

    2025, pp. 208, $ 17.00
    The English-language debut of one of the most exciting voices in contemporary Brazilian literature, The   Tokyo Suite is a gripping exploration...
  • Cover: The Café with No Name - Robert Seethaler

    Robert Seethaler

    The Café with No Name

    2025, pp. 208, $ 25.00
    From one of Austria’s most beloved and best-selling authors, comes this vibrant tale of love, companionship, and renewal set against the transformations...
  • Cover: The Malcontents - Sacha Naspini

    Sacha Naspini

    The Malcontents

    2025, pp. 480, $ 25.00
    There is a village carved into the rock of the Maremma hinterland in Tuscany and its name is Le Case. A dying country. A provincial trap. A microcosm...
  • Cover: A Calamity of Noble Houses - Amira Ghenim

    Amira Ghenim

    A Calamity of Noble Houses

    2025, pp. 432, $ 28.00
    A finalist for the 2021 International Prize for Arabic Fiction, a compelling saga of two families that illuminates the lives of women in modern...
  • Cover: The Other Profile - Irene Graziosi

    Irene Graziosi

    The Other Profile

    2025, pp. 208, $ 17.95
    A story of a conflicted friendship and its unraveling, told against the background of an ever-present, mind-twisting social media-verse

Join Our Newsletter and receive a FREE eBook!

Stay updated on Europa’s forthcoming releases, author tours and major news.

Are you a bookseller? Click here!

Are you a librarian? Click here!

X