Book Description 
AN INDIE NEXT PICK!
From the #1 bestselling author in Japan comes a celebration of books, cats, and the people who love them, infused with the heartwarming spirit of The Guest Cat and The Travelling Cat Chronicles.
Bookish high school student Rintaro Natsuki is about to close the secondhand bookstore he inherited from his beloved bookworm grandfather. Then, a talking cat appears with an unusual request. The feline asks for—or rather, demands—the teenager’s help in saving books with him. The world is full of lonely books left unread and unloved, and the cat and Rintaro must liberate them from their neglectful owners. 
Their mission sends this odd couple on an amazing journey, where they enter different mazes to set books free. Through their travels, the cat and Rintaro meet a man who leaves his books to perish on a bookshelf, an unwitting book torturer who cuts the pages of books into snippets to help people speed read, and a publishing drone who only wants to create bestsellers. Their adventures culminate in one final, unforgettable challenge—the last maze that awaits leads Rintaro down a realm only the bravest dare enter . . . 
An enthralling tale of books, first love, fantasy, and an unusual friendship with a talking cat, The Cat Who Saved Books is a story for those for whom books are so much more than words on paper. 
Translated from the Japanese by Louise Heal Kawai.
"Cats, books, young love, and adventure: catnip for a variety of readers!" –Kirkus
 
About the Author and Translator
Sosuke Natsukawa is a Japanese physician and novelist. He graduated from the Shinshu University medical school and practices medicine at a hospital in the largely rural prefecture of Nagano. His multi-volume debut novel, Kamisama no Karute (God's Medical Records), has won several prizes and has sold over three million copies in Japan. He is the author of the number one international bestseller The Cat Who Saved Books. The Cat Who Saved the Library is the second book in his series featuring Tiger the talking tabby cat.
 
Louise Heal Kawai has been a translator of Japanese literature since 2006, translating several different genres of contemporary fiction. Besides the novels on this list, she has published short stories in online magazines and journals, play scripts and the odd poem. In 2022 she translated the international bestseller The Cat Who Saved Books, and in 2023 Hideo Yokoyama's The North Light. Her latest release is Point Zero, the classic 1959 thriller by Seicho Matsumoto.