The Navidad Incident: The Downfall of Matías Guili

In this sweeping magical-realist epic set in the fictional south sea island Republic of Navidad, Ikezawa gives his imagination free rein to reinvent the myths of the twentieth century Japan. The story takes off as a delegation of Japanese war veterans pays an official visit to the ex-World War II colony, only to see the Japanese flag burst into flames. The following day, the tour bus, and its passengers, simply vanish. The locals exchanges absurd rumors—the bus was last seen attending Catholic mass, the bus must have skipped across the lagoon—but the president suspects a covert guerrilla organization is trying to undermine his connections with Japan. Can the real answers to the mystery be found, or will the president have to be content with the surreal answers?

“Breezy and fun, yet tranquil and mysterious… like a Japanese meeting of Kapuscinski’s The Emperor and a surrealist A House for Mr Biswas. An entire world.”

--Ben Loory, author of Stories for Nighttime and Some for the Day

About the author:
Natsuki Ikezawa (1945– ) was born in Hokkaido. Formerly enrolled at Saitama University, he quit school to become a poet. He lived in Greece for three years in the mid-1970s. Presently he writes not only fiction but criticism and is an active public speaker as well. Of his works, Still Lives and A Burden of Flowers are available in English, and The Navidad Incident—winner of the Tanizaki Jun’ichiro Prize—in German.