Surrealism, cafes and lots (and lots) of cats: why Japanese fiction is booming
From tales of alienation to comforting novels set in bookshops, Japanese authors have written nearly half of this year’s bestselling translated novels in the UK. What’s their secret?
John Self
Saturday 23 November 2024
Anyone who has been in a bookshop in the last few years will have noticed that Japanese fiction is experiencing an extraordinary boom. In 2022, figures from Nielsen BookScan showed that Japanese fiction represented 25% of all translated fiction sales in the UK. The dominance is even more striking this year: figures obtained by the Guardian show that, of the top 40 translated fiction titles for 2024 so far, 43% are Japanese, with Asako Yuzuki’s satirical, socially conscious crime novel Buttertopping the list. Butter also won the breakthrough author award at this year’s Books Are My Bag readers awards, which are curated by booksellers and voted for by the public.