Product Description: A fortuneteller hires a detective to find her missing son in this existential noir mystery. A startling clue leads the detective into the underground worlds of fortunetelling and "pleasure" tours. The missing son reminds him of an old case which ended badly, one he is compelled to reopen...read more

Product Description: "Shimoda is a consummate storyteller" — Booklist"Shimoda skillfully weaves (these) tales into the narrative, revealing how past events "continue to affect the island, like aftershocks." Earthquakes are an apt metaphor for the social disruptions on the island, and Shimoda links modern earthquake science, ancient Japanese myths on the origin of earthquakes, and an unforgettable cast of characters to create a suspenseful, richly illustrated novel...read more

Product Description: Oh! was selected for National Public Radio's summer reading list of 2009. NPR reviewer Lucia Silva called it "a triumphant kick in the pants for anyone who doubts the future of paper-and-ink books." “The mysterious tension between material things and emotional attachment to them oscillates throughout Japanese history and culture...read more

Product Description: A provocative new approach to journaling the self . . . Glyphix are what words look like when they are "felt and drawn" instead of spelled. Each person's Glyphix are a unique key to personality. Taking inspiration from Asian pictographs and using a Japanese shodo brush, L...read more (view table of contents, read Amazon.com's description)

A unique and beautifully illustrated new novel combines the seemingly incompatible world of Japanese calligraphy and American brain research in the story of a young Japanese-American woman studying neurobiology who finds a key to understanding how the brain works in her boyfriend's calligraphy teacher, the victim of a stroke.

Product Description: Curator Keizo Yukawa flees a dead-end job in Tokyo to head a new museum devoted to 365 paintings of Mt. Fuji by the genius Takenoko, who died 100 years ago. Takenoko's legacy of madness infects each member of the Ono family, who own the Views but do not get along...read more