![]() Some stories focus on introducing members of the community: the old chicken farmer who risks going to Chicken Hell to harass his hens the principal of a school for dogs Grandpa Shadows, whose two shadows don’t get along. This gleeful tone of wonder, matter-of-fact domestic compromise, fey visitation, and cheek-by-jowl coexistence of the mundane and the fabulous carries through the rest of the collection. When she asks, “Why did you come here?” the child thinks for a moment before answering, “It’s a secret,” and the story ends. When she lifts the cloth she discovers a bossy child who moves in with her and stays for the next 30 years, her constant companion, listening with “great sympathy” to her “tales of woe,” neither aging nor changing in any way. One day, while walking back to her room, the narrator comes across a white cloth lying underneath a zelkova tree. ![]() Kawakami's opening story, "The Secret," sets the stage for the book to come. ![]() ![]() Thirty-six linked fabulist shorts set in a small Japanese town. ![]()
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