Short Stories

Translated by Polly Barton Piercing, inventive, and darkly humorous, the fifty-two stories in Aoko Matsuda's The Woman Dies explore the persistent and pervasive sexism faced by women in modern-day Japan.The...

'What you see with your eyes is not necessarily real' A lavishly illustrated edition of Murakami's classic short story.Katagiri found a giant frog waiting for him in his apartment. It...

Twenty-two Short Stories by Japan's Master Storyteller Translated by Richard Medhurst Akutagawa displays an insightful and keenly creative intelligence in prose so lucid its sophistication is hardly visible.' Chris Power, The Guardian...

Translated by Polly Barton This ground-breaking collection from Tomoka Shibasaki, author of the acclaimed novel Spring Garden, pushes the short story to a new level. In these stories of human connection...

'Enchanting...intriguing [...] A wonderfully surreal quality and a hip, witty tone.' The Wall Street Journal Haruki Murakami's novels, essays and stories have sold millions of copies worldwide and been translated into...

From the authentic and original healing fiction author of TRAVELLING CAT CHRONICLES comes a 1.4-million-copy bestseller - set in a famously scenic railway line in Japan, following key emotional dramas...

Translated by Lucy North The Akutagawa Prize-winning stories from one of the most highly regarded and provocative contemporary Japanese writers: part of our Japanese novella series, showcasing the best contemporary...

A story of a frustrated, confined woman who becomes lost in a psychological maze of her own creation - a labyrinth of jealousy, loneliness and longing.Etsuko is a trapped woman...

A new selection of lyrically haunting short stories from a Japanese literary iconA writer is seized by apocalyptic visions; a voyeuristic marquis commits a brutal act; and a trio of...

No one really understands how we suffer. One day, when we're adults, we may come to recall this suffering, this misery, as silly and laughable, but how are we to...

Winner of the prestigious Akutagawa Prize, this collection of 3 tales of memory in wartime France is perfect for fans of Helen Oyeyemi and Banana Yoshimoto Visiting a friend in...

Classic Japanese Ghost Stories Enter the haunted world of Ancient Japan in this spine-tingling collection of ghostly tales told and retold across the centuries. From Goblin infested caves and haunted...

True Horror Stories from Japan When your house is haunted by demons, who do you call? The beautiful city of Kyoto has an ancient history but beneath its placid exterior...

Junji Ito Story Collection A collection full of grotesque imagination and surreal urban legends. Every night, a young man hears children playing outside his boarding house—but the alley below his...

Translated by Lucy North The startling first collection of dark, surreal, and unsettling stories from the international prize-winning author of The Woman in the Purple Skirt. Asa tries to give her...

A Life in Twenty Stories "Dazai's brand of egoistic pessimism dovetails organically with the emo chic of this cultural moment and with the inner lives of teenagers of all eras."...

Translated by Ted Goossen Included in The New Yorker's Best Books of 2023 Stories from a Japanese master of transformative fiction, where reality, myth, and human foibles meet shifting dimensions...

Two cult-favorite Japanese artists present eerie graphic adaptations of 9 classic Kafka short stories, with hypnotic illustrations that will appeal to fans of Junji Ito Franz Kafka’s work is given...

Haruki Murakami's best-loved stories finally in graphic novel form! Haruki Murakami's novels, essays and short stories have sold millions of copies worldwide and been translated into scores of languages. Now...

Bringing together novelist Osamu Dazai’s best autobiographical shorts in a single, slim volume, Self-Portraits shows the legendary writer at his best―and worst “Art dies the moment it acquires authority.” So said...

Translated by Ginny Tapley Takemori From the author of international bestseller Convenience Store Woman comes a collection of short fiction: weird, out of this world and like nothing you’ve read...

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...

For the first time in English, Osamu Dazai’s hilariously comic and deeply moving prequel to No Longer Human The Flowers of Buffoonery opens in a seaside sanitarium where Yozo Oba―the...

A “best of” collection of creepy tales from Eisner award winner and legendary horror master Junji Ito.This striking collection presents the most remarkable short works of Junji Ito’s career, featuring...

An immeasurably influential female voice in post-war Japanese literature, Kono writes with a strange and disorienting beauty: her tales are marked by disquieting scenes, her characters all teetering on the...

A mindbending new collection of short stories from the unique, internationally acclaimed author of Norwegian Wood and The Wind-up Bird Chronicle. A GUARDIAN AND SUNDAY TIMES 'BOOKS OF 2021' PICK...

'One never tires of reading and re-reading his best works. Akutagawa was a born short-story writer' — Haruki MurakamiThe stories in this fantastical, unconventional collection are subtly wrought depictions of...

Translated by Ginny Takemori and Ian MacDonald This prize-winning Japanese author offers stories haunted by history. 'If we want to understand what has been lost to time, there is no...

Translated by Ted Goossen From the best-selling author of Strange Weather in Tokyo, here is a collection of playful, delightful, delectable Japanese micro-fiction. Take a story and shrink it. Make...

Translated by Haydn TrowellA dream-like, emotionally charged tale by a bold new voice in Japanese fiction.Natsuko's husband Taichi was forced to stop working eight years ago by the sudden onset...

Tales of upheaval and confusion, longing and love in the aftermath of the Kobe earthquake. For the characters in After the Quake, the Kobe earthquake is an echo from a...

The first English language publication of the work of Izumi Suzuki, a legend of Japanese science fiction and a countercultural icon. On a planet where men are contained in ghettoised...

Ryunosuke Akutagawa rose from humble beginnings to become one of the most influential modern Japanese writers. He is known as 'the father of the Japanese short story' and 'Rashōmon is...

Izumi Suzuki had ideas of how things might be done differently, ideas that paid little the laws of physics, or the laws of the courts. In this new collection her...

Seven uplifting tales of warm, wise and sarcastic cats set in modern Japan through the changing seasons. The uplifting new Japanese cat novel from the million-copy bestselling author of The...

Ten tales of loss and longing, from one one Japan's greatest writersBringing together Yukio Mishima's finest stories, this selection shows his extraordinary ability to depict a wide variety of human...

Translated by James B. HarrisThis collection of mystery and horror stories is regarded as Japan's answer to Edgar Allan Poe.Japanese Tales of Mystery & Imagination, the first volume of its...

There was no past, no future, no words, nothing - just the light and the yellow and the scent of dry leaves in the sun.Japan's internationally celebrated storyteller returns with...

Akutagawa was one of the towering figures of modern Japanese literature, and is considered the father of the Japanese short story. This paradigmatic selection, which includes the stories that inspired...

Japanese fairy tales - enchanting, enigmatic stories of animals, human beings and the great natural world.Dark and innocent, sublime and whimsical, Miyazawa's stories have the ageless feel of the best...