Tsushima evades any label, her fiction transcends gender to focus on the existential loneliness that is at the heart of humanity. -- Kris Kosaka ― Japan Times Published On: 2015-08-08

Wonderfully poetic ... extraordinary freshness ... a Virginia Woolf quality -- Margaret Drabble ― BBC Radio 3

Spiky, atmospheric and intimate, filled with moments of strangeness that linger in the mind ― The Spectator

In this short, powerful novel lurk the joy and guilt of single parents everywhere ― Guardian

This exquisite and poignant novel . . . will resonate with single mothers always and everywhere -- Shami Chakrabarti

An extraordinary book . . . cool analytic intelligence propelled by sudden eruptions of passion -- Lisa Appignanesi

An astonishing and exquisite masterpiece about love, motherhood, female independence, and the restoration of a damaged family. Yuko Tsushima is an unforgettable name alongside great masters like Virginia Woolf, Alice Munro and Elizabeth Strout -- J. M. Lee, author of The Investigation

Yuko Tsushima was born in Tokyo in 1947, the daughter of the novelist Osamu Dazai, who took his own life when she was one year old. Her prolific literary career began with her first collection of short stories, Shaniku-sai (Carnival), which she published at the age of twenty-four. She won many awards, including the Izumi Kyoka Prize for Literature (1977), the Kawabata Prize (1983) and the Tanizaki Prize (1998). She died in 2016.