Selected for the USBBY Outstanding International Book List
It's autumn in Tokyo, and twelve-year-old Akira and his younger
siblings, Kyoko, Shige and little Yuki, have just moved into a new
apartment with their mother. Akira hopes it's a new start for all of
them, even though the little ones are not allowed to leave the apartment
or make any noise, since the landlord doesn't permit young children in
the building. But their mother soon begins to spend more and more time
away from the apartment, and then one morning Akira finds an envelope of
money and a note. She has gone away with her new boyfriend for a while.
Akira bravely shoulders the responsibility for the family. He shops and
cooks and pays the bills, while Kyoko does the laundry. The children
spend their time watching TV, drawing and playing games, wishing they
could go to school and have friends like everyone else. Then one morning
their mother breezes in with gifts for everyone, but she is soon gone
again.
Months pass, until one spring day Akira decides they have been prisoners
in the apartment long enough. For a brief time the children bask in
their freedom. They shop, explore, plant a little balcony garden, have
the playground to themselves. Even when the bank account is empty and
the utilities are turned off and the children become increasingly
ill-kempt, it seems that they have been hiding for nothing. In the
bustling big city, nobody notices them. It's as if nobody knows.
But by August the city is sweltering, and the children are too
malnourished and exhausted even to go out. Akira is afraid to contact
child welfare, remembering the last time the authorities intervened, and
the family was split up. Eventually even he can't hold it together any
more, and then one day tragedy strikes...
Based on the award-winning film by Kore-eda Hirokazu, this is a
powerfully moving novel about four children who become invisible to
almost everyone in their community and manage -- for a time -- to
survive on their own.
