“The past is never dead. It’s not even past.” Chapter 1: The Poisoning The novel opens with the horrific mass poisoning at the Aosawa family estate during a […]
Japanese literature
The Tokyo Zodiac Murders
“Astrology is a science, but murder is an art.” Chapter 1: The Bizarre Manuscript The novel opens with the discovery of a disturbing manuscript written by the eccentric […]
Japanese literature
Under the Midnight Sun
“The sun never sets on some sins.” Prologue The novel opens in Osaka, 1973, with the brutal murder of a pawnshop owner, Yosuke Kirihara. Detective Sasagaki is assigned […]
Japanese literature
Journey Under the Midnight Sun
“The sun doesn’t go down, and the darkness never comes. That’s what the midnight sun is like.” Chapter 1: The Murder at the Pawnshop The story begins in […]
German literature
The Story of Mr Sommer
“He was a man who walked. That was all. He walked and walked and walked.” Chapter 1: The Narrator’s Childhood The unnamed narrator recalls his childhood in a […]
French literature
Fresh Water for Flowers
“The dead don’t go anywhere. They’re all here. Each one in a box.” Fresh Water for Flowers follows Violette Toussaint, a cemetery caretaker in a small French town, […]
French literature
Out of the Dark
“I was nothing more than a shadow among shadows.” Chapter 1: The Encounter The narrator, Jean, recalls his time in Paris in the 1960s. He meets a mysterious […]
French literature
So You Don’t Get Lost in the Neighborhood
“Memory is a strange thing. When I was in the midst of it, it wasn’t there, and now that it’s no longer there, I can see it clearly.” […]
American literature
Paper Towns
“It is easy to forget how full the world is of people, full to bursting, and each of them imaginable and consistently misimagined.” Part One: The Strings The […]
American literature
Where the Crawdads Sing
“There are some who can live without wild things, and some who cannot.” Part 1: The Marsh Girl The story begins in 1969 with the discovery of Chase […]