”Sluggish Symbol, Inane Illusion” is a short novel written by Yuki Fujimura that is published on syosetsu.com, which I enjoyed so much I decided to translate into English. This story takes place in a society where each citizen is legally obligated to write a single book during their lifetime. You can see more information about this novel including a brief synopsis, my… Read More »
”Sluggish Symbol, Inane Illusion” is a short novel written by Yuki Fujimira that is published on syosetsu.com, which I enjoyed so much I decided to translate into English. This story takes place in a unique society, where each citizen is legally obligated to write a single book during their lifetime. You can see more information about this novel including a… Read More »
Recently I reviewed the short story ”Sluggish Symbol, Inane Illusion” (緩慢な表象と虚ろな幻想) which I discovered on the site syosetsu.com (review). (Note, I had originally translated the title as “Unreliable Symbol, Hollow Illusion”, but changed it after further consideration) After reading through several stories on that site, this is one of the few that I really liked, and I felt it… Read More »
A little while ago I reviewed the short story “Memoirs of a Traveller” (ある旅人の手記) which I discovered on the site syosetsu.com (review). After reading through many stories on that site, this is one of the few that I really enjoyed, and also I felt it would be a good candidate for an English translation. I wrote… Read More »
“Memoirs of a traveller” (ある旅人の手記) is another short story I recently found on the free novel and short story site 「小説家になろう」. It reasonably short, at around 8,000 characters, and is grouped in the “human drama” (ヒューマンドラマ) category. If you are like me, and haven’t heard of this word before, it basically means works that focus on… Read More »
Recently I reviewed the site “小説家になろう” which is where you can find thousands of free Japanese novels and short stories of various genres. One thing I’ve realized (again) when looking for Japanese stories to read is that I’m quite picky about the types of stories I read. I try to stay away from things that sound too commonplace, like… Read More »
I had gotten a recommendation that Jiro Akagawa was a good author so I decided on trying his work “Reserved Seat: Short short oukoku” (指定席〜ショートショート王国）published by Kobunsha in 2012 (digital version in 2015), which is a compendium of 32 short stories. They are generally on the very short side, tending to be under 10 pages each.… Read More »
We received “99 Tears” as a gift and since it was a relatively thin paperback book I decided to try it out. It’s a set of 12 short stories, each written by a different Japanese author. The settings and characters are all different, but they all share an emphasis on interpersonal relations, especially those with family.… Read More »