Kakigori Summer

Itami (Fault Lines) serves up an inviting and wistful tale of three sisters who reunite during a crisis. Ai Takanawa, a 20-something Japanese pop star and the youngest of the sisters, winds up in a scandal when she’s photographed being kissed by the married president of her record label. Her oldest sister, Rei, an investment banker in London, has just engaged in her own bit of reckless behavior, hooking up with her ex-boyfriend Sath at a wedding. She flies to Tokyo to meet middle sister Kiki, a single mother and health-care worker, and the pair hatch a plan to rescue Ai from the spotlight. They spirit her against her will to their secluded hometown of Ikimura, where they settle back into their childhood home with their ornery great-grandmother. While Ikimura provides the sisters with a haven from the paparazzi, the village also triggers troubling remembrances of their mother, who drowned herself when they were young. As they spend the summer eating matcha-flavored kakigori shaved ice and visiting the beach they played on as children, they attempt to find a way forward through their difficult adulthoods. Itami strikes just the right chord, showing how the sisters indulge their nostalgia for happier times even as they attempt to reckon with their painful memories. Readers are in for a treat. (June)