About the book: Can two very different women put aside their differences to save the bookstore they love?
Bookstore Girls (2025) is the Japanese bestseller about enemies-to-friends set in the cut-throat Tokyo publishing scene that kicked off a seven-book series - adapted for TV and 200,000 copies sold!
Riko Nishioka is assistant manager of the flagship Pegasus bookstore in Kichijoji. After working her way up from a part-time position, she is now, aged forty, a respected figure in the Japanese publishing industry.
But she has a nemesis.
Aki Kitamura, twenty-seven, has waltzed in as a full-time employee thanks to her family connections. A free spirit with a rebellious streak and a silver spoon in her mouth, she is anything but a team player.
The two are always clashing - both at work and over their personal lives.
But when Riko is given notice that the store will be closing in six months' time, they face a stark choice.
Can they put their petty enmities aside to boost sales and save their livelihoods or will they go down fighting . . . each other?
Bookstore Girls is translated from the Japanese by Hayden Trowell.
About the author: Kei Aono was born in 1959 in Nagoya, Japan and studied at Tokyo Art university. After starting her career at an anime magazine, she worked as an editor at a publishing company. In 2006, she made her fiction debut with The Reason I Won't Quit, and in 2014, Bookstore Girls won the Grand Prize in the "Book I want Made into a Movie" category at the Shizuoka Bookstore Awards. It went on to be adapted for television, sold 200,000 copies and laid the ground for six sequels.
About the translator: Haydn Trowell is an Australian translator of Japanese literature whose work has appeared in Granta, Electric Literature, and Words Without Borders. He has translated fiction by major prize-winning authors such as Yasunari Kawabata, Maki Kashimada, and Rie Qudan, and he has worked extensively with publishers in Australia, Japan, the UK, and the US. Haydn holds a PhD in translation studies from Monash University and has a background in both translation and creative writing. He delivers expertly crafted English renditions that capture the author’s unique voice and preserve the rich cultural nuances of the original, making each work feel authentic, engaging, and completely at home in its new language and environment.
Rating: 5/5
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