Lit in Translation

Spring Garden

春の庭 · Haru no niwa

Tomoka Shibasaki (柴崎友香, born 1973)

Translated by Polly Barton

English editions

In English

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Taro, who used to cut hair, settles after his divorce in a run-down block of flats in Tokyo's Setagaya ward that is due to be pulled down, its flats named after the signs of the zodiac. One day he catches a woman from the building, Nishi, a manga artist, trying to get over the wall into the neighbouring property. She has been fascinated since high school by a photo book called 'Spring Garden', shot in that pale-blue Western-style house, and rented a flat beside it for that reason. She befriends the family now living there and tours the house, but has no excuse to see the bathroom she longs for, so she pulls Taro into her plans.

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About the book

Form
Novel
Length
141 pages in the original
Set in
Japan
First published
2014 by Bungeishunju
Author's age
41 when first published
ISBN

9784163901015 (original)

9781782272700 (Pushkin Press, United Kingdom)

9781805331452 (Pushkin Press, United Kingdom)

More
Wikidata