On a windy hill in Japan, in a garden overlooking the sea,
stands a disused phone box. For years, people have travelled to visit the phone
box, to pick up the receiver and speak into the wind: to pass their messages to
loved ones no longer with us.
اضافة اعلان
Inspired by a real telephone box located in the north-east
of Japan comes “
The Phone Box at the Edge of the World” by Laura Imai Messina,
a novel about Yui, a woman who lost her mother and daughter in the 2011 tsunami
and is forced to navigate her grief as well as the life that lies ahead.
One day she hears of the phone box, and decides to make her
own pilgrimage there, to speak once more to the people she loved the most. But
when you have lost everything, the right words can be the hardest thing to
find.
Yui is intrigued and makes the drive from Tokyo. Along the
way, she meets Takeshi, who lost his wife, and whose young daughter, Hana, is
mute following her mother’s death, and together they find Bell Gardia, the
garden “on a hill in the middle of nowhere” with the wind phone.
As the pilgrimages to the phone box become a new routine,
Yui and Takeshi’s lives are further entwined as they, and the characters they
meet, each deal with grief — and with hope — in different ways.
“The Phone Box at the Edge of the World” is an unforgettable
story about the depths of grief, the lightness of love and the human longing to
keep the people who are no longer with us close to our hearts.
The moving and uplifting international bestseller, based on
an incredible true story
Written in Italian and published as Quel che affidiamo al
vento, the English translation was done by Lucy Rand. Rand’s translation is
fluent and seamless; she captures the lyricism and meditative quality of the
writing with care, a feat made more impressive given that there’s also a
distinct Japanese sensibility.
Reviews
“A moving and uplifting anatomization of grief and the small
miraculous moments that persuade people to start looking forward again.” —
Sunday Times
“Strangely beautiful, uplifting and memorable, it’s a book
to savor.” — Choice, Book of the Month
“A poignant, atmospheric novel dealing with love, coming to
terms with loss and the restoration of one’s self.” — Daily Mail
“A story about the dogged survival of hope when all else is
lost … A striking haiku of the human heart.” — The Times
“Beautiful. A message of hope for anyone who is lost,
frightened or grieving.” — Clare Mackintosh
“Mesmerizing … beautiful … a joy to read.” — Joanna Glen,
Costa shortlisted author of The Other Half of Augusta Hope
“Spare and poetic, this beautiful book is both a small,
quiet love story and a vast expansive meditation on grieving and loss.” — Heat
“A perfect poignant read.” — Woman & Home
About the author
Laura Imai Messina has been living in Japan for the last 15
years and works between Tokyo and Kamakura, where she lives with her Japanese
husband and two children. She holds a Masters in Literature from the
International Christian University of Tokyo and a PhD in Comparative Literature
from the Tokyo University of Foreign Studies. “The Phone Box at the Edge of the
World” has been sold in over 21 territories.
Lucy Rand is a teacher, editor, and translator from Norfolk,
UK.
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