[−]
  • Search
Share Organize Explore

has ALL you need!

A community for book lovers to create their own bookshelves, share and explore books.

Sign Up for FREE!

Wrong About Japan

A Father's Journey With His Son

By Peter Carey

Paperback | 9781400078363

Book Description

Previous winner of two Booker Prizes, Peter Carey expands his extraordinary achievement with each new novel — but now gives us something entirely different.

When famously shy Charley Carey becomes obsessed with Japanese manga and anime, Peter is not only delighted for his son, but entrContinue

Previous winner of two Booker Prizes, Peter Carey expands his extraordinary achievement with each new novel — but now gives us something entirely different.

When famously shy Charley Carey becomes obsessed with Japanese manga and anime, Peter is not only delighted for his son, but entranced himself. Thus, with a father sharing his twelve-year-old’s exotic comic books, begins a journey that will lead them both to Tokyo, where a strange Japanese boy will become both their guide and judge. The visitors quickly plunge deep into the lanes of Shitimachi — into the “weird stuff” of modern Japan — meeting manga artists and anime directors, “visualists” who painstakingly impersonate cartoons, and solitary “otakus” who lead a computerized existence. What emerges from these encounters is a pithy, far-ranging study of history and culture both high and low — from samurai to salaryman, from kabuki theatre to the post-war robot craze. Peter Carey’s observations are provocative, even though his hosts often point out, politely, that he is wrong about Japan. In adventures that are comic, surprising, and ultimately moving, father and son cope with and learn from each other in a place far from home.


“No Real Japan,” said Charley. “You’ve got to promise. No temples. No museums.”

“What could we do?”

“We could buy cool manga.”

“There’ll be no English translations.”

“I don’t care. I’d eat raw fish.”


—excerpt from Wrong About Japan


From the Hardcover edition.

Book Details

Improve data of this book

Prices Change currency & sellers

ISBN Edition List Sale Seller
9781400078363 Paperback $11.95 $10.16 Amazon US
£8.17 -- Amazon UK
$14.23 $12.81 Amazon CA
¥2091.00 ¥1778.00 Amazon JP
Other editions

Inline Translation Mode

Left click to navigate, right click to translate.

inline translation guide

or close

Inline translation is not ready for this page yet.

Inline translation mode.

Share this page with your friends.

The viewport has not loaded.