A Japanese list for DK
Discover dark Japanese fiction with this curated reading list, featuring Natsuo Kirino's Grotesque, Eimi Yamada's Bedtime Eyes, and 村上龍's 69—essential books for fans of bold, literary Japanese storytelling.
Book
Monkey Brain Sushi
by Alfred Birnbaum
Cyberpunk, sci-fi and erotica all meld together in this collection ofutting-edge short stories. The authors tend towards near-zero emotionalhill, stunned urbanity and a shiny kind of violence.
Book
69
by 村上龍
In 1969, they were seventeen. They read Rimbaud, played guitars, smoked pot, fell in love, rebelled against the establishment, protested the war in Vietnam, barricaded high school, and produced the first rock festival in their home town. This title presents the coming of age during a time that left its mark on baby boomers around the world. In 1969 we were seventeen. We listened to the Beatles, the Stones, the Doors, the Velvet Underground, the Grateful Dead, Cream, Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin, and Bob Dylan. We read Rimbaud, played guitars, smoked pot, fell in love, rebelled against the
Book
Bedtime Eyes
by Eimi Yamada
Amy Yamada is one of the most prominent--and controversial--novelists in Japan today. She bursted onto the scene in 1985 with her short novel "Bedtime Eyes," which for critics embodied the spirit of the 'shinjinru'--i.e. Generation X-- in much the same way that Less Than Zero, Bright Lights, Big City, and Douglas Coupland did in the U.S. Bedtime Eyes is the first English-language publication of three of Yamada's novellas/short novels: "Bedtime Eyes," "The Piano Player's Fingers" and "Jesse." While all are centered around the relationship between a Japanese woman and a black American man, each explores love, sex, and the vast gulf between from different and equally revealing viewpoints. Starkly imagined and sharply observed, Bedtime Eyes introduces to the English language some of Yamada's best known and most influential work.
Book
Grotesque
by Natsuo Kirino
Life at the prestigious Q High School for Girls in Tokyo exists on a precise social axis: a world of insiders and outsiders, of haves and have-nots. Beautiful Yuriko and her unpopular, unnamed sister exist in different spheres; the hopelessly awkward Kazue Sato floats around among them, trying to fit in.Years later, Yuriko and Kazue are dead — both have become prostitutes and both have been brutally murdered. Natsuo Kirino, celebrated author of Out, seamlessly weaves together the stories of these women’s struggles within the conventions and restrictions of Japanese society. At once a psychological investigation of the pressures facing Japanese women and a classic work of noir fiction, Grotesque is a brilliantly twisted novel of ambition, desire, beauty, cruelty, and identity by one of our most electrifying writers.
