Tales From the Cafe Summary
Toshikazu Kawaguchi

Tales From the Cafe Overview

In Toshikazu Kawaguchi's novel Tales from the Café, four customers visit the mysterious Funiculi Funicula café, having heard that the establishment allows patrons to travel in time. Gohtaro, Yukio, Kurata, and Kiyoshi all come to the café in hopes of visiting loved ones in the past or the future. They feel sorrow and despair, regret and guilt for the ways in which these relationships have transpired, and hope that traveling backwards or forwards in time might afford them reconciliation and redemption. The novel explores themes including guilt, deception, and happiness.