Excerpt from Tokyo Ueno Station by Yu Miri, plus links to reviews, author biography & more

Instead I bought them each a Matsunaga ice cream, which cost fifteen yen then. Yoko brightened up immediately, but Kichi turned his back to me and began to cry, his body shaking with sobs as he watched the helicopter take off, full of boys with wealthy parents.

He pawed at his tears with his fists.

That day the sky was as blue as a strip of cloth. I wanted to give him that helicopter ride, but I couldn't afford it, and so I couldn't-I still regret it. And ten years later, on that awful day, that regret again stabbed my heart, it is still with me now, it never leaves-

They never move, the red strokes that spell the words ueno zoo like scratches on an arm, nor do the fingers of the children wearing red, blue, and yellow, arms raised over the fence, on the sign for the children's amusement park.

Trembling like a solitary reed, I want to talk as much as I can, but I don't know how to go about it. I fumble for a way out, I want to see one so badly, but the darkness does not fall nor does the light shine in. It's over, but it never ends ... this constant anguish, sorrow, grief-

A gust of wind rustled through the trees, shaking the leaves and sending drops of water falling, though the rain seemed to have stopped.

At Sakuragitei, the little red-and-white lanterns swayed in the wind and a woman in a red apron stood on a stepladder, brushing off the faded pink awning, which read, in white letters, Panda Cakes.

Excerpted from Tokyo Ueno Station by Yu Miri. Copyright © 2020 by Yu Miri. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.