One Hundred Years and a Day

Missed connections and the passage of time feature in this captivating collection by Akutagawa Prize winner Shibasaki (Spring Garden). In place of conventional titles, most of the 34 tales begin with a synopsis, such as one about the history of two entwined wisteria plants growing on an abandoned shop front. In another, a man named Katō disembarks from a train at a random stop and winds up staying for several months to date Satō, a university student who works in a local bar. Years later, when Katō revisits the town, he sees a woman who looks exactly like Satō and decides it must be her, even though she’d left years earlier to marry another man. Such misunderstandings about people and objects repeat throughout the collection, as in a story about a novel purchased in a second-hand shop by a student, who misinterprets the written message on the back page as a love letter. A later owner of the book accurately recognizes the message as note of condolence to a bereaved family. Barton’s light touch preserves the mystery and longing in Shibasaki’s liminal tales. Readers of Aimee Bender or Haruki Murakami will love this. (Feb.)