Akira is lost and alone in Japan, he knows he must find his family and rescue his little sister, but he can’t quite remember what from. Accompanied by new companions, Julian and Chie, he must trek across northern Japen to complete his mission. Along their journey the threesome encounters a host of yokai monsters and infamous ghosts, including an immortal cat and plenty of haunted houses.
100 Tales from the Tokyo Ghost Café is a genre-defying gift of a novel. The interlinking ghost stories range from bone-chilling terrifying to hilarious to emotionally stirring and will appeal to a breadth of readers. Moreover, they can be read as standalone stories or enjoyed as a whole.
The story is told in a mix of prose and manga, an expertly handled blend that will open the prose story to manga aficionados and the manga story to those who tend towards traditional novels. With Japanese words and folklore featuring heavily throughout, this is must read for young people interested in learning more about Japanese culture.
A ghostly journey through Northern Japan in search of yokai monsters and the Otherworld, told equally in manga and prose.
Abducted by spirits from his village, lost boy Akira must make the long journey in north Japan to find his family and save his young sister, before time runs out.
Voyaging deeper and deeper into a Japan 'between the worlds', Akira and his companions encounter a host of yokai monsters and famous ghosts, discovering a sometimes comical and sometimes terrifying world of interlinked and ghostly short stories along the way.
Julian Sedgwick is the author of six books for children, and co-author of the graphic novel Dark Satanic Mills and illustrated novel Voyages in the Underworld of Orpheus Black.
On the way to realising his childhood ambition to write, Julian read Chinese Studies and Philosophy at Cambridge, before working as a bookseller, painter, researcher and script developer for film and TV, and shiatsu therapist.
For the last three years Julian has been patron of reading for Leighton Park School and has now visited over 150 schools both in the UK and abroad. Voyages in the Underworld of Orpheus Black has just been shortlisted for the Carnegie Medal 2020.
Julian lives near Ely, Cambridgeshire is married and has two grown-up sons. He still combines writing with his work as a therapist. In his spare time he draws as much as possible, juggles torches and knives, tries his best to learn Japanese - and waits for the weather to get cold enough to go fen skating.
