Mizuki Nomura - Book Girl and the Wayfarer’s Lamentation

In accordance with the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, the scanning, uploading, and electronic sharing of any part of this book without the permission of the publisher constitute unlawful piracy and theft of the authors intellectual property. If you would like to use material from the book (other than for review purposes), prior written permission must be obtained by contacting the publisher at permissions@hbgusa.com. Thank you for your support of the authors rights.

Book Girl and the Wayfarers Lamentation
Story: MIZUKI NOMURA
Illustration: MIHO TAKEOKA
Translation by Karen McGillicuddy
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the authors imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.
Bungakushoujo to doukoku no palmiere 2007 Mizuki Nomura. All rights reserved.
First published in Japan in 2007 by ENTERBRAIN, INC., Tokyo.
English translation rights arranged with ENTERBRAIN, INC. through Tuttle-Mori Agency, Inc., Tokyo.
English translation 2012 by Hachette Book Group, Inc.
All rights reserved. In accordance with the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, the scanning, uploading, and electronic sharing of any part of this book without the permission of the publisher is unlawful piracy and theft of the authors intellectual property. If you would like to use material from the book (other than for review purposes), prior written permission must be obtained by contacting the publisher at permissions@hbgusa.com. Thank you for your support of the authors rights.
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Hachette Book Group
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First e-book Edition: July 2012
ISBN 978-0-316-20223-7

I got another phone call today.

When I heard the hysterical ringing, like the caterwauling of tomcats, my hair instantly stood on end, my body started trembling, and I felt like the hot nails of pain and discomfort clawing at my stomach would send me over the edge.

The world would be so much more peaceful if there were no phones.

The phone only spits out ugly words, dirty words, cursed words.

Their clinging, spiteful, unrestrained, mean voices thick with miasma fill a world that should be beautiful with garbage.

I wish all these people who make the phone ring so obnoxiously would just die!

What is true happiness?

In one corner of the universe, there was a boy who pondered that.

My happiness was Miu.

Before, just having Miu by my side made my heart leap, and when Miu crafted stories in her bright, clear voice, everything around us glittered with rainbows.

Im gonna be a writer. Tons of people are going to read my books. It would be awesome if that made them happy.

In a warm dappling of sunlight through the trees, her ponytail swaying, Miu talked about her dreams for the future with gleaming eyes.

Youre the only one I told, Konoha. Because youre special.

She whispered in a pretty voice, tilting her head like a small bird and looking straight at me with teasing eyes.

Whats your dream, Konoha? What do you want to be when you grow up?

Mius face came close enough to kiss, so I was sweating horribly and didnt know which way to look anymore.

I thought about it carefully, wringing my brain out with both hands until I began to grow desperate, knowing that I had to answer her. My cheeks grew hot, and finally

I want to bea tree.

When I said that, she guffawed at me.

Three years have passed since then.

I lost my holy land, and Miu went into hiding. After a dark period living as a recluse, I became a normal high school student.

Now that my second year of high school was nearing its end, still ignorant of the meaning of happiness and still not a tree, I wrote a snack story for the book girl in the clubroom that had been dyed a soft golden color in the sunset.

Shadow over Innsmouth by Lovecraft has the taste of slurping up raw fish blood, yknow.

It was after school, like always. Tohko had burst out with that proclamation out of nowhere. I was shocked, and I paused in writing the improv story.

Old books monopolized the room in the western corner of the third floor. The stacks of books had formed mounds all over, and on top of being cramped, the room was dusty.

The fold-up chair next to the window was reserved for Tohko, and today she was again sitting there reading a book. Her thin, black braids like cats tails hung past her hips. Her small feet, swathed in school socks, rested crassly on the chair, and she turned the pages with her white fingers. As she read, she tore small pieces from the edges of the page, then brought them to her rosy lips. She then ground them between her teeth with a rapturous expression.

Ahhh, how delicious. This rawness that pricks the nostrils. The cool, chewy texture. Just what youd expect from Lovecrafts greatest work, from the master of fantasy literature, the father of the Cthulhu Mythos! The goopy tartness of blood coating my tongueits too much!

Weird.

Tohko wasnt supposed to like scary stories.

I am a book girl who loves all the books of this world so much that I want to devour them, she boasted regularly, but even a president like that had weaknesses.

Although she would say that the horror and gorefest stories I deliberately wrote for her were F-fine, really, she ate them with a lot of sniffles. But today, Tohko seemed to be honestly reveling in the taste of stuff like rotten fish eyeballs and gooey fountains of blood.

Howard Phillips Lovecraft was an American author born in 1890. The fantasy stories he wrote about the resurrection of Elder Gods who had dominion over the Earth in antiquity were systematized after his death into whats come to be called the Cthulhu Mythos. Since then, scores of authors inspired by the mysterious and ghastly dark myths have published stories about Cthulhu.