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A Heartwarming Novel of Time Travel, Magical Realism and the Power of Healing (Before the Coffee Gets Cold Series, 1)
by Toshikazu Kawaguchi
If you could go back in time, who would you want to meet?
In a small back alley of Tokyo, there is a café that has been serving carefully brewed coffee for more than one hundred years. Local legend says that this shop offers something else besides coffee—the chance to travel back in time.
Over the course of one summer, four customers visit the café in the hopes of making that journey. But time travel isn't so simple, and there are rules that must be followed. Most important, the trip can last only as long as it takes for the coffee to get cold.
Prepare to meet four visitors, each of whom is hoping to make use of the cafe's time-travelling offer in order to:
- confront the man who left them
- receive a letter from their husband whose memory has been taken by Alzheimer's
- see their sister one last time, and
- meet the daughter they never got the chance to know.
Heartwarming, wistful, mysterious and delightfully quirky, Toshikazu Kawaguchi's internationally bestselling novel explores the age-old question: What would you change if you could travel back in time?
What are you reading this week? (12-26-2024)
I promised myself that I'd read a couple fun/easy read books between Christmas and the first part Jan 2025. I started "Of Mutts and Men" by Spencer Quinn which is a mystery about a private PI and his dog partner Chet. If you are a dog lover, you'll really enjoy this book because the book is writt...
-Jill_Mercier
What was the last book you bought, where did you buy it (online, indie bookstore) and how soon will you read it?
Before the Coffee Gets Cold by Toshikazu Kawaguchi. I don't read time travel books, but this one caught my eye because the travel time occurs from a coffee shop and is limited to the time between when...
-Jill_Mercier
"Charming." —Star Tribune
"Endearing." —New York Times Book Review
"Heartwarming, quirky, and wistful." —HuffPost
This information about Before the Coffee Gets Cold was first featured
in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.
Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
Toshikazu Kawaguchi was born in Osaka, Japan, in 1971. He has produced, directed and written for the theatrical group Sonic Snail. His works as a playwright include Couple, Sunset Song and family time. His play Before the Coffee Gets Cold won the grand prize at the Suginami Drama Festival. Before the Coffee Gets Cold has become an international bestseller and has been adapted for the screen in Japan.
If you liked Before the Coffee Gets Cold, try these:
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