Contents: “Introduction” by Raechel Dumas “A Cultural Dynasty of Beautiful Vampires: Japan’s acceptance, Modifications, and Adaptations of Vampires” by Shimokusu Masaya “Blue Lady” by Inoue Masahiko, tr. Neil Webb “Kingdom” by Asukabe Katsunori, tr. Laura Wolly Dominguez “The Stone Castle” by Kikuchi Hideyuki, tr. Jonathan Bunt “The One-Legged Woman” by Okamoto Kido, tr. Neil Webb
Here’s my joint-SFT review with Joachim Boaz over at Science Fiction and Other Suspect Ruminations, this time on Izumi Suzuki’s “Terminal Boredom” (1984, trans. 2021). Check it out here!
For over twenty years (2002-2025), Kurodahan Press brought Anglophone readers a wealth of fascinating fiction and nonfiction from and about Japan. A major focus of this press was speculative fiction, resulting in a number of works in the genres of science fiction, fantasy, weird, uncanny, and horror being translated into and published in English. Kurodahan
Edward Lipsett, an American immigrant to Japan and a professional translator, founded Kurodahan Press with two colleagues in Japan in 2002. Between then and 2025, Kurodahan Press published a wealth of Japanese texts in various genres (including speculative fiction) in English translation. Here, I ask him about sf, publishing, and translation. Rachel at SFT (SFT):
translated by Matt Treyvaud original publication (in Japanese): 2002 first English edition: 2018, Haikasoru 352 pages grab a copy here or through your local independent bookstore or library **spoilers** “What does it mean to remember? What is a memory?” (79). Thus opens Chapter 3 of Tobi Hirotaka’s sf-horror novel The Thousand Year Beach (skillfully translated
translated by Kathleen Taji original publication (in Japanese): 1999 first English edition: 2012, Kurodahan Press 344 pages grab a copy here or through your local independent bookstore or library Crystal Silence is one of the many excellent works of Japanese sf in translation published by the now-sadly-shuttered Kurodahan Press. Sprawling, technically detailed, and ambitious, Fujisaki
“Giant Grandmother” by Liu Maijia, translated from the Chinese by Blake Stone-Banks (Clarkesworld, October 1) Black Hole Heart and Other Stories by K. A. Teryna, translated from the Russian by Alex Shvartsman (Fairwood Press, October 1) The world is not how we perceive it. A blizzard may be the fury of a whale god. Intelligent
On LitHub, translator Yuki Tejima talks about translating Mizuki Tsujimura’s Lost Souls Meet Under a Full Moon (Scribner) into English.
Sympathy Tower Tokyo by Rie Qudan, translated from the Japanese by Jesse Kirkwood (S&S/Summit Books, September 2) Welcome to the Japan of tomorrow. Here, the practice of radical sympathy toward criminals has become normalized. The incarcerated are considered victims influenced by their environments to commit crime and are labeled accordingly as Homo miserabilis. A grand,
My series on SF in Translation of the early 1960s can be found on the Seattle Worldcon 2025 website. Posts so far include: Fantastic Fiction: Kōbō Abe and Post-War Japanese SFT Fantastic Fiction: Perry Rhodan Fantastic Fiction: Nathalie Henneberg’s Forays into the Strange Fantastic Fiction: SF in Central/Eastern Europe Fantastic Fiction: Stanisław Lem, 1961 Fantastic
