“DNA contains two types of base pair sequences. Exons are meaningful templates for making proteins. Introns are meaningless, random sequences. Yet introns account for ninety-five percent of human DNA. Why is such a huge proportion of the genome reserved for useless code?"
What if all that genetic information wasn't really useless? What if it was put there by someone, something, in the impossibly distant past, for a purpose? And what if humanity's interest in understanding and engineering human DNA unlocks something that should have remained hidden?
(more…)Lonely people trapped in webs of their own design, seeking hope, love, forgiveness, validation... Five stories reveal the innermost hopes and fears of ordinary women, and men, facing the demands of others and of themselves in cool marriage and cold betrayal, exploring new avenues through new encounters.
Born just after Japan transitioned from the Shogunate to Meiji, Kidō grew up in a samurai-oriented world being transformed by the West in many ways. As a reporter he covered domestic developments and overseas wars, while also marrying a traditional geisha, eventually becoming a playwright and author. In addition to a number of well-received plays, he also penned more than fifty horror stories over a roughly ten-year period starting in the mid-1920s. Just prior to this period, the Great Kantō Earthquake of 1923 destroyed almost everything in Tokyo that remained from the Edo era, and Japanese horror itself was transitioning from the traditional uncanny stories to more modern horror structures.
(more…)Bounty hunter Shooter searches the badlands of 1880s Kansas for four outlaws—the “Dreams Made Flesh” minions born of the fleeting thoughts of Cthulhu—and manages to shoot one, but the outlaw’s corpse vanishes to leave only mysteries: he shot bullet after bullet, but never reloaded, and his gun was icy cold.
(more…)Obey Not Know
Essays on Japanese Law and Society
by Colin Jones
Like many things Japanese, the Japanese legal system has its peculiarities... and Professor Jones applies his decades of legal and teaching experience to shed light on its mysteries. As with most legal systems there is method to its madness, and while the reasoning behind it all is a bit different from the approaches of Western nations, it works. Usually.
(more…)A journey into the carefree, today-centric generation of Japan's economic boom years, as they enjoy the cosmopolitan lifestyle of Tokyo while exploring new dimensions in Japanese society and self-image. It won the coveted Bungei Prize partly because it was so completely different from the relatively staid, traditional literature of the time, but also because it served as a guide into the evolving world of a rich, global, commercialized nation and a younger generation who grew up never knowing war.
Winner of the 1980 Bungei Prize
Finalist for the 1981 Akutagawa Prize.
Gold Mask is Edogawa Rampo's sixth novel featuring detective Akechi Kogorō, as he investigates the crime spree of the uncanny costumed “Gold Mask.” Lovers of crime fiction will be delighted to discover that this resourceful thief, confounding Akechi’s every move, is none other than Maurice Leblanc's famous "gentleman burglar," Arsene Lupin! Given Lupin's obvious influence on Rampo's own Fiend with Twenty Faces, this work serves as a fascinating precursor to his Boy Detectives series, and marks another major step in the development of Japanese detective fiction in the period between the Wars.
(more…)A diverse cross-section of Japan passes through the bar Lui, and the bartender tends to them all, with all their hopes and their fears. Underneath the black suits—whether crumpled or designer—and the cosmetics, they're all people on the way to somewhere else in Tokyo's glittering boom era. The bartenders and Mama-sans who keep everything running smoothly rely on their own camaraderie, night after night.
Winner of the 1975 Naoki Prize.
Strokes of Brush and Blade
Tales of the Samurai
Selected by Edward Lipsett
The samurai were more than just warriors, although of course when war came they were ready. For a thousand years they were, in a very real sense, the glue that held Japan together through all the emperors and shoguns who wielded the power.
(more…)Vampiric:
Tales of Blood and Roses from Japan
Japan has always had its own vampire tradition, and has eagerly naturalized Western vampires and vampire literature to produce exotic new hybrids and species of horror, of terror, and of sensual, exquisite beauty. Here are a few of their masterpieces.
(more…)World War II was a world-spanning conflict that engulfed dozens of countries, a maelstrom that dragged nations and religions and millions of people to their deaths.
But it was fought with more than merely guns and machines...
Erinys, tiny moon of Uranus, home to a tinier and almost forgotten colony. Left behind in the debris of the failed Outer Planet Revolt in 2099, Erinys is quietly decaying.
For the hunted remnants of the Outer Planet Alliance (OPA), however, it offers a potential hiding place, and, possibly, a way to independence for the Outer Planets.
With a highly detailed background, realistic technology, and convincing characters, The Erinys Incident is a fascinating journey from deep in the gravity well of the sun,
to lonely outposts far beyond the rings of Saturn.
A new collection of stories by Yasutaka Tsutsui, famed in Japan and worldwide for his darkly humorous, satirical handling of a vast range of themes central to the human condition.
Although often criticized for his treatment of "taboo" subjects such as disabilities, the Emperor, and old age, he is also recognized as one of the founders of post-modern science fiction in Japan.
Speculative Japan 4
"Pearls for Mia" and Other Tales
The fourth book of our well-received Speculative Japan series introduces new talents from Japan, and fresh new stories by some of the outstanding authors we've introduced to the English-speaking world already. From deep in the mountains of the Japanese countryside to the plains of frigid Pluto, from a warm South Pacific isle to a freezing mountainside, to Mars or inside a lonely psyche... a positive smorgasbord of speculative enjoyment, in English for the first time!
(more…)In a world of humans, what's a cyborg turtle to do?
It's a fair question in the bizarre, compelling story of Mr. Turtle.
Yusaku Kitano's science fiction masterpiece, originally published under the eponymous title Kame-kun, renews the visionary integrity that won it the Nihon SF Taisho (Japan's equivalent of the Nebula) Award in 2001 as it finds its way into English at last.
Kitano's protagonist is a hero in a half shell of an altogether different sort, a killing machine designed for combat who wants only to enjoy the simple pleasures of his daily life—working a blue collar job,
going to the library, and typing on his laptop—even as he is haunted by vague memories of a war on Jupiter.
Tokyo Decadence:
15 Stories by
Ryu MURAKAMI
Translated by Ralph McCARTHY
A cream-of-the-crop selection of Murakami's brilliance and piercing wit.
This collection shows sides of Ryu Murakami that even avid fans may not be expecting.
Miyamoto Teru has established a considerable and devoted following in Japan, and is rapidly building a devoted readership in other Asian countries and parts of Europe as his fiction is translated into various languages. With only a few of his works currently available in English, however, Anglophone readers have for the most part been unaware of the "Teru" literary phenomenon. This book brings together his most famous work, the superlative Rivers Sequence: "Muddy River," which was published in 1977 and won the 78th Akutagawa Prize; "River of Fireflies," published the following year and promptly winning the 13th Dazai Osamu Prize; and "River of Lights," also published in 1978 but later extensively rewritten and expanded into a novel. All three works have been released as major films in Japan.
(more…)Long Belts and Thin Men:
The Postwar Stories of
KOJIMA Nobuo
Introduced and translated by
Lawrence ROGERS
Kojima Nobuo is best-known in English for his outstanding novella, "Amerikan sukuuru" (1954, "The American School"), which earned the Akutagawa Prize that year. Strongly affected by World War II and the postwar era, his style evolved into a powerful, often painfully honest satire depicting the Japanese male as a Milquetoast, under the thumbs of women and society in general. Influenced by Gogol and other giants of Russian literature, Kojima's style and technique immerse the reader in the doubts and dilemmas of his characters to powerful effect.
(more…)On the Brink: The Inside Story of Fukushima Daiichi
Ryūshō KADOTA
Translated by
Simon VARNAM
with technical supervision by
Akira TOKUHIRO
Professor and Director, Nuclear Engineering, University of IdahoMarch 11, 2011.
The Tōhoku earthquake struck just before three on a Friday afternoon. Massive earthquake damage was followed by tsunami rising to heights of 40 meters that swept 10km inland, scouring the land of homes, schools, communities, and people.
The earthquake and tsunami alone were disasters of incredible proportion, resulting in over 15,000 deaths, over 100,000 buildings destroyed, and economic losses estimated as high as $235 billion by the World Bank.
And that was only the natural disaster.
(more…)Akechi Kogorō, detective extraordinaire.
In Japan, this is a name that fires the hearts and imaginations of readers young at heart. Cool and sophisticated, Akechi moves effortlessly through the world of Japan in the golden era between the wars, defeating masterminds and saving the day. He has been the hero of Japanese children for generations, and starred in a host of movies.
The stories in this volume predate all of that; his secret origin, if you will. Readers familiar with the exploits of the great detective Akechi Kogorō might have some difficulty recognizing the impeccably dressed and universally respected man of action in the amateur detective, an eccentric twenty-something of little means with disheveled hair and a shabby kimono. The Akechi who appears in this volume is a hobbyist in crime whose identity is not yet fixed either in the eyes of the reading public or in the mind of his creator. Supporting characters such as Akechi's wife and his young assistant have not yet been introduced, and the first confrontation between the great detective and the Fiend with Twenty Faces is still a decade away.
(more…)The Nobility of Failure
Tragic Heroes in the History of Japan
by Ivan MORRIS
Preface by Juliet Winters Carpenter
Alexander, Robin Hood, Wellington, George Washington... The Western literatures are packed with the stories—real and otherwise—of diverse heroes, but most of them share the common element of victory. Many of them died heroically to achieve their goals.
In Japan, however, many of the most revered heroes lost their lives without achieving their goals, and in many cases fought their battles in full realization that they would end in abject defeat and death.
This cultural background remains a bedrock underlying the modern Japanese psyche, and continues to shape the Japanese as individuals and a society even today, unconsciously, in the same way the West is still affected by the myths and legends passed down from Greece and Rome.
Citadel in Spring
—A Novel of Youth Spent at War—
by AGAWA Hiroyuki
Translated by Lawrence ROGERS
Translated by Lawrence ROGERS
Published in Japanese in 1949, Citadel in Spring is, at its heart, an autobiographical novel of the author's life from university through induction into the Imperial Japan Navy, assignment to intelligence service in China, and Japan's final defeat. In addition to details of actual code-breaking activities, it also paints grimly honest pictures of some of the fiercest naval battles of the war, and the horrors of the Hiroshima atomic bombing. As a witness to World War II and its effects on the people and culture of Japan, this document—although cast as fiction—is a crucial reminder of the real costs of war to a generation who have never experienced it.
(more…)Scholars and fans often divide the career of Dazai Osamu (1909–1948) into three periods—early, middle, and late. The early and late periods tend to get all the attention, but in fact Dazai was at his very best in the middle period, which corresponds roughly to the years of the Pacific War. All the stories in this collection, with the exception of the early "Romanesque," were written during that time.
(more…)The eBook edition of Fujisaki Shingo's near-future science fiction masterpiece, Crystal Silence, is now available! Now you can enjoy his artificial intelligence, cyberspace, Mars colonies and gravity-manipulating aliens on your eBook reader, too!
And for those of you who still haven't discovered the world of Crystal Silence we invite you to sample a side-story, a prequel of sorts, set in the same universe: Left Alone.
Both eBooks are available from major eBook retailers worldwide.
Read more about Crystal Silence and Left Alone here!
Otogizōshi: The Fairy Tale Book of Dazai Osamu
by DAZAI Osamu
Translated by Ralph MCCARTHY
Introduction by Joel Cohn
Momotarō, Click-Clack Mountain, The Sparrow Who Lost Her Tongue, The Stolen Wen, Urashima-san . . . The father reads these old tales to the children. Though he's shabbily dressed and looks to be a complete fool, this father is a singular man in his own right. He has an unusual knack for making up stories.
Once upon a time, long, long ago . . .
Even as he reads the picture book aloud in a strangely imbecilic voice, another, somewhat more elaborate tale is brewing inside him.
(more…)Edogawa Rampo's The Fiend with Twenty Faces
—A Tale of the Boy Detectives Club
EDOGAWA Rampo
Translated by
Dan LUFFEY
The Fiend with Twenty Faces, the first in the Boy Detectives series by Japan's master of mystery Edogawa Rampo, helped create a new genre in Japan and enthralled thousands of young readers.
(more…)Murder in the Red Chamber, first published in Japanese by Bungei Shunjū as part of its "Mystery Masters" series, is set in the world of the original Dream of the Red Chamber, the masterwork of eighteenth-century Chinese fiction by Cao Xueqin. Building skillfully on that famous background, Ashibe plays out a most formidable murder mystery set in Peking during the late Qing dynasty. The tale opens with the visitation of Jia Yuan-chun, esteemed daughter of the prosperous Jia family and newly instated concubine to the emperor.
(more…)It is 2071, and Mars is being slowly terraformed by many nations often cooperating in an uneasy truce that reflects tensions back on Earth. The water of the polar ice cap, the most important resource for all the Mars colonies, is jointly controlled by the US, China, Japan and Russia, and doled out to the second-tier colonizing groups (Europe, Canada, Australia, India) only grudgingly. A military build-up is under way as different groups jockey for control of this all-important resource, and then the bodies of what appear to be intelligent aliens are found under the Martian ice.
Nominated for the 2012 Science Fiction and Fantasy Translation Awards!
(more…)Queen of K’n-Yan
By ASAMATSU Ken (朝松 健)
Translated by Kathleen TAJI
Introduction by Darrell SCHWEITZER
“Asamatsu Ken’s Queen of K’n-Yan is a fascinating story, and as Darrell Schweitzer states in his introduction, it is indeed a fine Cthulhu Mythos novel…”
—Brian Lumley
The mummy of a beautiful young girl from Shang Dynasty China is found in an ornate and astonishingly large underground tomb. Preliminary research shows that her cells contain reptilian DNA, and a Japanese research lab is asked to investigate further…
(more…)The Edogawa Rampo Reader
Stories and essays by EDOGAWA Rampo
Edited and translated by Seth JACOBOWITZ
With an introduction by TATSUMI Takayuki
Edogawa Rampo (pseudonym of Hirai Tarō, 1894-1965) is the acknowledged grand master of Japan's golden age of crime and mystery fiction. He is also a major writer in the tradition of Japanese Modernism, and exerts a massive influence on the popular and literary culture of today's Japan.
The Edogawa Rampo Reader presents a selection of outstanding examples of his short fiction, and a selection of his non-fiction prose. Together, they present a full and accurate picture of Rampo as a major contributor to the Japanese literary scene, helping to clarify his achievements to the English-speaking world.
(more…)The Black Lizard and
Beast in the Shadows
by EDOGAWA Rampo
Translated by Ian HUGHES
With an introduction by Mark SCHREIBER
Edogawa Rampo (pseudonym of Hirai Tarō, 1894-1965) is the acknowledged grand master of Japan’s golden age of crime and mystery fiction. Kurodahan Press takes great pleasure in presenting the first English language translations of these two short novels.
(more…)Administrator, or Shiseikan in Japanese, took the Japanese SF community by storm when first published in 1974. Unlike traditional space opera, it pushed technology into the background to present a compelling portrait of colonial governors, the Administrators, trapped between the conflicting demands of Federation government, native inhabitants, and Terran colonists.This collection of four novelettes, the first volume of an extensive series of works set in the same universe, touches on key stages in the development of the Administrator system and the robots designed to support and protect it.
(more…)This important work of Japanese science fiction presents the story of Yūichi, a youth who escapes the regimented world of Japanese society for the beauty and freedom of Aphrodite, a floating island city built by the visionary Mr. Caan. Excited by the seemingly limitless potential of Aphrodite and confident of his own future, Yūichi encounters a new world: friendship, responsibility, love, and growing up.
Seen through the pattern of Yūichi’s life, however, is the evolution and development of the true heroine of the work: the island city Aphrodite--ever beautiful, ever filled with the limitless energy of creation. And as the global economy spirals downward, leaving Aphrodite a deserted slum slated for destruction, perhaps Yūichi is the only person who can save her…
Ideal for young adult readers, but with a philosophical depth to make it a thought-provoking and rewarding book for adult readers as well.
(more…)