What Happens When You Have Only a Few Minutes to Choose a Book

Let me continue our Japanese journey book haul stories. I should add a special tag for this topic, though. On our last day, we finally entered the huge Kinokuniya bookstore, which features a separate floor dedicated to English translations of Japanese writers. There was no time for reading summaries and dipping into the books, so I mostly cast an eye over the titles. At the last moment, after picking up ‘When the Museum is Closed’ by Emi Yagi, I grabbed “Whoever Steals This Book” by Nowaki Fukamidori. The first chapter of the book is called “Chased by the Flags of Magic Realism,” so I supposed it would be something in Borges’ or Márquez’s style.

In fact, it turned into a young adult novel about a teenage girl who travels through the various bookish multiverses, searching for a book thief. Likewise, among them, you can recognize: 

• a tale with ancient beliefs about celestial bodies and weather phenomena;  

• hard-boiled detective story with all necessary clichés;

• steampunk fantasy novel with Victorian outfits and poor Dickens-like orphans;

• a mix of a misanthropy novel and dystopia, where the main hero is left behind in a lonely town;

• memoirs, revealing old family secrets.

In addition, let’s add a Japanese cultural setting (red torii gates, shrines, mouthwatering descriptions of traditional food, etc.). Although I was looking for a different genre, I was pleased to experience something new.

While reading, I got a feeling of anime-like, somehow. So, can you imagine my surprise when I found that the novel got a manga adaptation? Moreover, an anime film adaptation is announced to premiere in Japan in December 2025. So that you like the plot, you can choose the genre that matches you the most.