Laura Imai Messina has created a quiet, emotional story that’s based on real-life events. This is not a book you rush through, it’s a book to savour. The plot is subtle and delicate and the slow pace allows the reader to embrace the beautiful, often poetic, prose.

Whenever I read a translation, I am always blown away by the beauty of the words and how they transcend the translation to bring us that beauty in both the language it was written in and the one I am reading it in. This book in particular had so many stunning passages, that despite my overall indifference to its plot, I couldn’t help but fall in love with the writing. This is a beautiful novel with a message of hope. It is about two people who are confined to the silence of grief - Yui who lost her mother and daughter in the March 2011 Tsunami, and Takeshi who lost his wife to cancer and whose young daughter no longer speaks. What I loved about this book was knowing that it was inspired by a true story. Known as "The Phone of the Wind" in Japan, the phone box sits in the garden of its caretaker in Bell Gardia. A radio host, Yui first heard about the wind phone when she was moderating a discussion on grief. A caller, who had also lost a loved one in the 2011 tsunami, described the phone box with a phone doesn’t work; there’s no connection but the caller says that “your voice is carried away with the wind” and when he speaks to his wife he feels Das Leben zerrte an einem Menschen, mit der Zeit entstanden unzählige Risse und Brüche, doch vielleicht waren es ja genau sie, die die Geschichte eines Menschen formten und ihn anspornten, herauszufinden, was als Nächstes geschehen würde.<

Inspired by a real telephone box located in the north-east of Japan comes The Phone Box at the Edge of the World by Laura Imai Messina, a novel about Yui, a woman who lost her mother and daughter in the 2011 tsunami and is forced to navigate her grief as well as the life that lies ahead. The harrowing aftermath of a natural disaster strips away normality with the sudden and unprepared death of loved ones and the destruction of property. Yui is heartbroken following a Tsunami that hit Japan on 11 March 2011 and took her mother and young daughter’s lives. Yui radiates a reverent sorrow, which captures the sense of loss. Amidst heartbreak and tenderness, she tries making sense of everything through a shroud of grief. The international bestselling novel sold in 21 countries, about grief, mourning, and the joy of survival, inspired by a real phone booth in Japan with its disconnected “wind” phone, a place of pilgrimage and solace since the 2011 tsunami The Phone Box at the Edge of the World, Laura Imai Messina, Lucy Rand (trans) (Overlook Press, March 2021; Manilla Press, June 2020)

Incredibly moving. It will break your heart and soothe your soul' - Stacey Halls, Sunday Times bestselling author of The Familiars The central character of The Phone Box At The Edge Of The World was Yui. Yui was a woman that had everything, including a mother and daughter that she loved dearly. Their death in the 2011 tsunami changed her life irrevocably. Yui decides to join the many who make the long trek to Belle Gardia to speak to her beloved family members. Instead, Yui finds an unexpected friend in Takeshi. Takeshi was a doctor and a widow. His beloved wife, Akiko perished in the disaster. Hanna, Takeshi’s daughter, was deeply affected by the loss of her mother as she has not spoken since that day. When Yui meets the father and daughter, all their lives will be changed forever. The novel will publish on 25th June 2020 as one of the fiction launch titles of Bonnier Books UK’s new literary fiction and non-fiction imprint, Manilla Press. Written in Italian and published as Quel che affidiamo al vento, the English translation was done by Lucy Rand. Rand’s translation is fluent and seamless; she captures the lyricism and meditative quality of the writing with care, a feat made more impressive given that there’s also a distinct Japanese sensibility (the author has been living in Japan for the past 15 years). marzo 2011: al largo della costa della regione di Tōhoku, nel Giappone settentrionale, ci fu Il sisma, con epicentro in mare e con successivo tsunami, più potente mai misurato in Giappone e il quarto a livello mondiale.

There is a stillness and quietness to the book that makes each movement all the more meaningful. The words carry a weight that makes each sentence feel intentional; there’s no fat to trim. Moving and heart-breaking, Yui’s story—and that of the Wind Phone—is equally uplifting and heart-warming. In parts, it is also a reflection on religion. What it is and what it is for, and what we do instead of it if we have no such beliefs. Maybe it takes an atheist to need a disconnected telephone, where the Buddhist would simply stand in front of the family butsudan and do exactly the same thing. Or an animist/pantheist or whatever else it is I might be to go sit on a beach and speak to the waves. To end on a positive note, there were a few things I did appreciate about The Phone Box At The Edge Of The World. I felt I had a deeper understanding of how the tsunami effected the people of Japan in the short or long term on a practical and emotional level. I also enjoyed immersing myself in the Japanese culture as Messina imparted the knowledge she has gained from living in Japan with her husband in an easy manner.When Yui loses both her mother and her daughter in the tsunami, she begins to mark the passage of time from that date onward: Everything is relative to March 11, 2011, the day the tsunami tore Japan apart, and when grief took hold of her life. Yui struggles to continue on, alone with her pain. Yui in uno dei suoi tanti viaggi verso il telefono del vento incontra Taseki, che aveva perso la moglie. E così, “il momento in cui si incontravano iniziò ad apparire a entrambi non come il raccogliersi di due sconosciuti in un punto del mondo per poi raggiungerne un altro, bensì come un ritorno. Era lui che tornava a lei. Era lei che tornava a lui.” Takeshi goes into the phone box and talks to his wife. Yui walks in the garden and doesn't talk to her mother or her daughter. She looks at the ocean and eats chocolate to hold the nausea at bay. But even in the very first days, she went and looked at the ocean. That isn't explained in the book, to me, it is a refusal to let the beauty of nature be lost to its cruelty.