Laura Imai Messina's work delves into comparative literature and her expertise in teaching Italian language. Her research deeply explores the materiality within texts, examining how physical elements manifest across Japanese and European literary traditions. Messina offers a unique perspective on the interconnectedness of cultures and languages, informed by her sustained life in Japan.
From the international bestselling author of The Phone Box at the Edge of the World: a powerful, moving novel of grief, hope, friendship and love based around a real archive on an island in Japan, where people travel to record their heartbeats. To find what you have lost, you must listen to your heart .
When you have lost everything, what will you find? When Yui loses her mother and daughter in the tsunami, she wonders how she will ever carry on. Yet, in the face of this unthinkable loss, life must somehow continue. Then one day she hears about a widower who has an old disused telephone box in his garden.