Yoko Ogawa

Though I’ve tried, I’ve found no way to fill in the voids left by the Memory Police.

he believed that mistakes were often as revealing as the right answers. This gave us confidence even when our best efforts came to nothing.

I couldn’t hear him clearly, but I decided not to ask him to repeat himself, in case it had been something less romantic

Jealousy seems to make me suffer in the most unexpected ways

I must have had a good reason for wanting to kill myself, but I’ve forgotten what it was

You can’t be forced to reveal what you don’t know, but if you do know something, there’s no telling what they might do to get it out of you.

We listened to the quiet clicking of the clippers, their echoes sealing this moment in the depth of the night.

worries seemed to form like so many bubbles, but unlike bubbles they floated about forever in my head, refusing to pop

“It’s the most beautiful disappearance ever.”

A rose garden without roses was a meaningless, desolate place, and it was terribly sad to see the trellises and other signs of all the care that had been lavished on the flowers