A jaded journalist inherits an abandoned manuscript penned by an old acquaintance who has recently passed away. The writing―a collection of ruminations on the nature of existence by a fifty-three-year old businessman who, as far as the journalist remembers, was a kind and gentle soul―is nothing short of shocking.
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A jaded journalist inherits an abandoned manuscript penned by an old acquaintance who has recently passed away. The writing―a collection of ruminations on the nature of existence by a fifty-three-year old businessman who, as far as the journalist remembers, was a kind and gentle soul―is nothing short of shocking. In it, this apparent everyman―whom we know only as Mr. K―writes that he has a son, daughter, and wife, but has no love for them. He claims that humans are like cancer cells, destroying Mother Earth with their unrestrained propagation. He looks at our mortal destiny with an unflinching honesty and turns to psychic mediums for clues to the afterlife, wondering what immortality―if it were possible―would mean for our spiritual well-being. Me Against the World takes the reader down the rabbit hole of the raging mind of this man, who only rejects the world in order to save it from itself.
Born in 1958, Kazufumi Shiraishi is a prolific, award-winning novelist who debuted in 2000 to great critical acclaim with Isshun no hikari (A Ray of Light). His novel Boku no naka no kowareteinai bubun (The Part of Me That Isn’t Broken Inside), published in 2002, became a national best-seller and is forthcoming from Dalkey Archive Press. The winner of two major Japanese literary awards (the Yamamoto Shūgorō Prize and the Naoki Prize), he currently lives in Tokyo with his wife.
Interview with the author available on our website.