Published: 2025
By the two-million-copy bestselling author of What You Are Looking for Is in the Library comes her enchanting brand-new novel, translated by Takami Neida.
Set in a suburban community in Tokyo, where an urban legend about the little hippo at the centre of a children’s playground has it that if you take a ride on its back and touch any part of your body to it that needs comfort, you will be healed. A highly imaginative, exquisite story of five people, humorously and warmly characterized, whose encounters with this adorable little hippo will change all of their lives. Aoyama wrote in this space before ‘healing fiction’ became a category – her books are authentic and a cut above, as she brings us profound portraits of a community we feel we might actually know.
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