12 Dec / Before Your Memory Fades [Before the Coffee Gets Cold, Book 3] by Toshikazu Kawaguchi, translated by Geoffrey Trousselot [in Booklist]
In the third installment of the internationally best-selling Before the Coffee Gets Cold series, some of the familiar crew from Tokyo’s Café Funiculi Funicula move to Hakodate’s Café Donna Donna on Hokkaido after its proprietor, Yukari Tokita, leaves indefinitely for the U.S. to help a young boy find his vanished father. In the meantime, Yukari’s son, Nagare, has come up from Tokyo to fill in for “his flighty and capricious” mother, along with his cousin Kazu and her 7-year-old daughter, Sachi, the newest coffee pourer.
Just like Funiculi Funicula, Café Donna Donna is a portal for time traveling. New regulars appear here: wannabe comic Reiji, who initially asked for Nagare’s help to keep Donna Donna open; psychiatrist Saki; and local university student Nanako.
Toshikazu Kawaguchi repeats his four-part format to introduce another time-defying quartet: a woman who lost her parents, half of an award-winning comedy duo mourning his late wife, an older sister missing her younger sister, and an all-too-unaware lovesick lover.
Once more, translator Geoffrey Trousselot provides English readers an opportunity to bask in another of Kawaguchi’s gently winsome soul-warming tales.
Review: “Fiction,” Booklist, October 15, 2022
Readers: Adult
Published: 2022