Andrew Miller was born in Bristol in 1960. He has lived in Spain, Japan, Ireland and France, and currently lives in Somerset. His first novel, INGENIOUS PAIN, was published by Sceptre in 1997 and won the James Tait Black Memorial Prize for Fiction, the International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award and the Grinzane Cavour prize in Italy. He has since written four novels: CASANOVA, OXYGEN, which was shortlisted for the Whitbread Novel Award and the Booker Prize in 2001, THE OPTIMISTS, and ONE MORNING LIKE A BIRD. (20081020)

Tokyo, 1940. While Japan’s war against China escalates, young Yuji Takano clings to his cocooned life: his beloved evenings of French conversation at Monsieur Feneon’s, visits to the bathhouse with friends, his books, his poetry.

But conscription looms and the mood turns against foreigners, just when Yuji gets entangled with Feneon’s daughter. As the nation heads towards conflict with the Allies, Yuji must decide where his duty – and his heart – lies.