Acclaimed creator Kaoru Mori's tale of life on the nineteenth-century
Silk Road continues as Mr. Smith extends his journey. This time, he is
welcomed into the home of a wealthy tradesman and his wife, Anis. Custom
dictates that, as a woman, Anis is not permitted to meet their visitor
face-to-face, but even so, she counts herself blessed to live in such a
beautiful estate and be married to a man who devotes himself solely to
her. Still, one cannot help but long for the companionship of another
person when one's closest friend is a reluctant Persian cat. In her
loneliness, Anis visits the public bath house and discovers a place
where she feels immediately free among her fellow sisters.
Crafted in painstaking detail, Ms. Mori's pen breathes life into the
scenery and architecture of the period in this heart-warming,
slice-of-life tale that is at once wholly exotic, yet familiar and
accessible through the everyday lives of the characters she has
created.