PERHAPS A GIFT VOUCHER FOR MUM?: MOTHER'S DAY
Yukio Mishima (Author) Yukio Mishima was born in 1925 in Tokyo, and is considered one of the Japan's most important writers. His books broke social boundaries and taboos at a time when Japan found itself in a state of rapid social change. His interests, besides writing, included body-building, acting and practising as a Samurai. In 1970 he attempted to start a military coup, which failed. Upon realizing this, Mishima performed seppuku, a ritual suicide, upon himself. He was nominated for the Nobel Prize for Literature three times.
Mishima is the Japanese Hemingway * Life Magazine * Strikingly different... Stephen Dodd's translation captures Mishima's dark humour, succinct style and dry wit -- Vanora Bennett * The Times Literary Supplement * A brilliant black comedy following the Osugi family, who come to the understanding that they are each from a different planet. This new knowledge strengthens their bond while solidifying a mission: to seek others of their kind and save humanity from the looming threat of the atomic bomb. This is an insightful, moving read. Mishima deserves a wider readership -- Irenosen Okojie * The i * Set in the early 1960s, this bonkers story of aliens trying to save mankind from nuclear war is told from the perspective of one family, all of whom come from a different planet. It's a biting social satire that's utterly transporting * Sunday Times Best Books for Summer 2023 * Ordinary people harbour the grandest (and most terrible) thoughts in a cosmological fable as disconcerting as it is funny: behind the simplest actions lie visions of worlds in collision -- Simon Ings * The Times * The Oscar Wilde of Japan ... one of Japan's great novelists ... his subtlety, warmth and wit shine through * Telegraph * A mixture of humour, high literary seriousness and flying saucers ... remarkable -- Sam Leith * Spectator * A writer of immense energy and ability * Time Out * One of the greatest avant-garde Japanese writers of the twentieth century * New Yorker * Among Japan's most celebrated post-war authors * Little White Lies * Interplanetary, quite extraordinary ... a fusion of sci-fi and social satire with great pathos, awash with dark humour and scenes of intense beauty ... Mishima blends the sublime and ridiculous in provocative and surprising ways ... a fresh and limpid translation -- Bryan Karetnyk * Financial Times * Moves from vividly described scenes of ordinary human life and the beauties of the natural world to arguments about human nature and whether peace is possible this side of death -- Lisa Tuttle * Guardian Best Recent Science Fiction * Its humour may be the book's most brilliant trait ... intense and earnest, the novel contains plenty of Mishima's spectacular writing ... an impressive accomplishment by Dodd in conveying a sense of import, sophistication and mastery of prose -- Eric Margolis * Japan Times * A delightfully strange, absorbing work. Full of humour and insight. Highly recommended -- Irenosen Okojie The wunderkind of the Japanese literary world ... an extraordinary literary talent * The Times Literary Supplement *
