• "...,there’s no perfect book, with no mistakes. [...] There’s always a mistake hiding somewhere."

• -- (Fuyuko Irie)

For the last episode of Mineral House in 2024, we will walk quietly next to a mid thirties, freelance proofreader in Japan, Fuyuko Irie. She’s having a birthday soon on Christmas' eve. Usually on the night of her birthday, she walks alone around the city, enjoying the lights. Fuyuko is a main protagonist in Mieko Kawakami's novel, All the Lovers in the Night (すべて真夜中の恋人たち / Subete Mayonaka no Koibitotachi). It was first published in September 2011 issue of the Japanese literary monthly Gunzo. In 2022, the novel was translated from Japanese into English by Sam Bett and David Boyd, published by Europa Editions.

Fuyuko describes her life defined by careful routine, devotion to work and solitude. Working and living alone in a city where it is not easy to form new relationships, she has little regular contact with anyone other than her editor, Hijiri Ishikawa. As a professional proofreader, trained to search for mistakes in other people’s writing, she is just as capable of finding faults in other people, as well as in her own work and, in an understated way, her own lives as well. She seeks perfection, knowing at the same time that it is impossible.

About the Author

Mieko Kawakami, is a Japanese writer, singer and poet from Osaka. Her work has won prestigious Japanese literary awards in several genres, including the 138th Akutagawa Prize for her novella Chichi to Ran and Murasaki Shikibu Prize for Literature for her first full length novel, Heaven. Her 2019 novel Natsu Monogatari, as an expanded version of the best seller, award-winning Chichi to Ran, was translated in English as Breasts and Eggs in 2021.

Learn more about Kawakami and her works at https://www.mieko.jp/

Tracklist:

• Norah Jones - The Story

• Frédéric Chopin - Berceuse Op. 57

• Kings of Convenience feat. Feist - Love Is A Lonely Thing

• Kaki King - Everybody Loves You

• Enji - Aya

• Sault - Alcohol

• The Zenmenn & John Moods - Into the Heart Of the Matter

• Jingga - Tentang Aku

• Nicole Mitchell, Tomeka Reid, Mike Reed - Jo Jar

• Nina Simone - See‐Line Woman (Masters at Work Remix)

• Don Glori - Diareme

• Nubiyan Twist feat. Nick Richards - Tell It To Me Slowly

• DKD - Future Rage

• Jimi Tenor & Florence Adooni - Vocalize My Luv

• Nana Benz Du Togo - J'AI COMPRIS

• The Avalanches - Since I Left You

• [Incl. audio samples from Tokyo Winter Night Walk (https://www.youtube.com/watch?app=desktop&v=v5VOTx1YfAg&t=0s)]