Mina's Matchbox

Yoko Ogawa author Stephen Snyder translator

Format:Hardback

Publisher:Vintage Publishing

Published:15th Aug '24

Should be back in stock very soon

Mina's Matchbox cover

On sleepless nights, I open the matchbox and reread the story of the girl who gathered shooting stars.

After the death of her father, twelve-year-old Tomoko is sent to live for a year with her uncle in the coastal town of Ashiya. It is a year which will change her life.

The 1970s are bringing changes to Japan and her uncle's magnificent colonial mansion opens up a new and unfamiliar world for Tomoko; its sprawling gardens are even home to a pygmy hippo the family keeps as a pet. Tomoko finds her relatives equally exotic and beguiling and her growing friendship with her cousin Mina draws her into an intoxicating world full of secret crushes and elaborate storytelling.

Rich with the magic and mystery of youth, Mina’s Matchbox is an evocative snapshot of a moment frozen in time, and a striking depiction of a family on the edge of collapse.

'I read Mina’s Matchbox like a besotted child, enraptured, never wanting it to end' RUTH OZEKI, author of The Book of Form and Emptiness

'Dreamy and whimsical' Esquire, Best Books of the Summer

'A conspicuously gifted writer. . . She possesses an effortless, glassy, eerie brilliance' Guardian


Readers adore Mina’s Matchbox:

‘I was totally swept away by it.’

‘ A beautiful coming of age story. I'd recommend it to any lovers of translated fiction!

Uplifting. And Pochiko, the pygmy hippo? A wonder.’

A conspicuously gifted writer…To read Ogawa is to enter a dreamlike state... She possesses an effortless, glassy, eerie brilliance' * Guardian *
A transfixing coming of age tale set in early 1970s Japan. [Tomoko] uncovers a host of secrets that force her to question her family’s complicated history * Time Magazine, Summer Reads *
This elegant, unusual novel full of eccentric personages is a Wes Anderson movie waiting to happen * Oprah Daily *
Yoko Ogawa is a quiet wizard, casting her words like a spell, conjuring a world of curiosity and enchantment, secrets and loss. I read Mina’s Matchbox like a besotted child, enraptured, never wanting it to end. * Ruth Ozeki, author of The Book of Form and Emptiness *
One of Japan’s most acclaimed authors * Time Magazine *
Ogawa, an award-winning novelist both in her native Japan and in the United States, writes with exquisite artistry about the complications of a close-knit household whose members are quietly protective of its wounding secrets, as seen through the eyes of a young girl; the novel is beautifully translated by Snyder * Library Journal *
If you loved The Memory Police, you’ll be excited for Ogawa’s “hypnotic, introspective novel” ... Tomoko and her cousin Mina decipher the world around them: the family’s strange dynamics, her uncle’s absences, her aunt’s misery, and her great-aunt’s experience of the Second World War, in a coming-of-age story that’s sure to be transformative * Lit Hub *
This engaging bildungsroman explores the friendship and mutual curiosity between two extraordinary young people...Facing complicated themes with deceptively simple language...A charming yet guileless exploration of childhood’s ephemeral pleasures and reflexive poignancy. * Kirkus *
Immersive and poignant. . . filled with wonder * Bookpage *
Evokes the secret crushes and crushing secrets of girlhood with charm and elegance * People *

ISBN: 9781787302761

Dimensions: 225mm x 145mm x 28mm

Weight: 395g

288 pages