Before the Coffee Gets Cold: The cosy million-copy sensation from Japan: 1

Description

Before the Coffee Gets Cold by Toshikazu Kawaguchi is a heartwarming story that starts the Japanese series of novels. This bestseller has already gained immense popularity among readers all around the world. Set around a mysterious hundred-year-old café specializing in serving cold-brewed coffee and located somewhere in the middle of the quiet backstreets of Tokyo, Before the Coffee Gets Cold invites the reader to plunge into a fascinating story of mysterious meetings and long-awaited farewells.

The plot line revolves around one central idea of mysterious time travel that has already become a hallmark of Kawaguchi’s storytelling. One can only visit the café and go through the extraordinary experience of time travel twice in a lifetime. Moreover, the rules of the establishment require the visitors to sit in the same seat when visiting the café and not to change anything in the past, returning everything to its original state when leaving.

With an emotional and engaging story that eventually turns out to be not a single but a collection of different plots and characters, Before the Coffee Gets Cold becomes a truly unforgettable tale. The novel’s protagonists try to recreate different moments of their lives, whether it is about seeing their old lover one last time, trying to cure Alzheimer’s disease or a dementia-afflicted sister, going back in time to deliver an unpresented gift to their child, or simply meeting a child who grew up in their neighborhood and becoming a friend to him.

Before the Coffee Gets Cold is a magical realism novel that reflects the themes of love, family, memory, and forgiveness, telling heart-wrenching stories of people trying to control time and eventually accepting that it is unable to stop or rewind it. Before the Coffee Gets Cold, written by Kawaguchi and translated by the remarkable Geoffrey Trousselot, was a delightful experience, an absolutely new perception of Japanese literature for me.
If you like this book, you might want to check these titles similar to Before the Coffee Gets Cold: Tales from the Cafe, Before Your Memory Fades, Before We Say Goodbye, Before We Forget Kindness, and Before I Knew I Loved You.