River of Dolls and Other Stories

These stories, many of which riff on traditional Japanese folk tales and lore, explore the lives of individuals caught between desire and duty, as well as the conflicting expectations of different cultures. For example, in 'Day Pass,' a college student in South Carolina befriends a female prisoner on a work release program, thinking that she will be a good influence, but then realizes that she has gotten in over her head. In 'Blue Murder,' a Japanese farmer troubled by the crows eating his pears becomes besotted with a kingfisher. The narrator of 'Down the Mountain,' a descendant of the Heike clan, recounts the tragic life and death of her beloved sister as she urges her own daughter to leave their secluded mountain village and go out into the world, and in the title story, 'River of Dolls,' a Japanese woman struggles with infertility. Ranging from dirty to magical realism, the stories collected here are often infused with humor, while exposing universal truths.

American Suzanne Kamata has lived in Japan for over thirty years. Her writing has appeared in The Best Asian Short Stories in 2017, 2022, and 2023 and The Best Asian Travel Writing 2020, The APWT Drunken Boat Anthology of New Writing, Telltale Food: Writings from the Fay Khoo Award 2017– 2019, and numerous other anthologies. She is the author of a previous short story collection, The Beautiful One Has Come (2011), which won a Nautilus Silver Award and a Next Generation Indie Best Award; the young adult novels Gadget Girl: The Art of Being Invisible (2013), named an Honor Book by the Asian American Pacific Librarians Association, and Indigo Girl (2019) a Freeman Honor Book. Her most recent novel is The Baseball Widow (2021). She is an associate professor at Naruto University of Education.