Tales of Hina Dolls and Other Writings

Hina dolls hold a child’s memory of his mother: their little lacquered drawers, delicate faces and creaking carriage seem capable of lives of their own. Years later, a rice-cake shop beside the Abe River opens onto another doll display and an encounter that refuses to remain an ordinary holiday memory.

In Rain Apparitions, a tale of a headless oil seller, a toad and a mushroom unfolds through the narrator’s playful interruptions. Rainfall begins beside the communal baths at Shuzenji, then follows an ill-planned night train journey through missed connections, hungry expectations and the distressing sight of a sick traveler. Comedy gives way to embarrassment and compassion.

Hail Falls returns to the sounds of a childhood house: a well bucket, an empty staircase, a lamp and the remembered shelter of a mother’s arms. Two women appear together, their identity never finally settled. This edition preserves all five supplied collection positions, including a clearly disclosed second occurrence of Hail Falls, and offers four distinct complete writings with notes on cultural allusions and original readings.