Book cover of Kwaidan: Stories and Studies of Strange Things

Book description

This collection of Japanese supernatural stories is a classic work in the field of Japanese horror.

Known primarily as an early interpreter of Japanese culture and customs, the famous writer Lafcadio Hearn also wrote ghost stories-"delicate, transparent, ghostly sketches"-about his adopted land. Many of the stories found in Kwaidan, "stories…

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Why read it?

1 author picked Kwaidan as one of their favorite books. Why do they recommend it?

On my very first night in Japan, some twenty years ago, my friend told me a local ghost story as we ascended a deserted, dark back street of Tokyo. It featured no-face ghosts (nopperabo) and, memorably, the chills merged with my jet lag to bring me face-to-almost face with the world of Japanese spirits in my first hours in the country. A couple of days later my friend gifted me a copy of Hearn’s Kwaidan and it remains a treasured book to this day. Hearn’s retellings of classic Japanese ghost stories are as valued to this day in…

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December on 5C4 by Adam Strassberg,

Magical realism meets the magic of Christmas in this mix of Jewish, New Testament, and Santa stories–all reenacted in an urban psychiatric hospital!

On locked ward 5C4, Josh, a patient with many similarities to Jesus, is hospitalized concurrently with Nick, a patient with many similarities to Santa. The two argue…

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