Me against the world - Kazufumi Shiraishi

A jaded journalist inherits an abandoned manuscript penned by an old acquaintance who has recently passed away. The writinga collection of ruminations on the nature of existence by a fifty-three-year old businessman who, as far as the journalist remembers, was a kind and gentle soulis nothing short of shocking. In it, this apparent everymanwhom we know only as Mr. Kwrites that he has a son, daughter, and wife, but has no love for them. He claims that humans are like cancer cells, destroying Mother Earth with their unrestrained propagation. He looks at our mortal destiny with an unflinching honesty and turns to psychic mediums for clues to the afterlife, wondering what immortalityif it were possiblewould mean for our spiritual well-being.Me Against the Worldtakes the reader down the rabbit hole of the raging mind of this man, who only rejects the world in order to save it from itself.

Born in 1958, Kazufumi Shiraishi is a prolific, award-winning novelist who debuted in 2000 to great critical acclaim withIsshun no hikari(A Ray of Light). His novelBoku no naka no kowareteinai bubun(The Part of Me That Isn't Broken Inside), published in 2002, became a national best-seller and is forthcoming from Dalkey Archive Press. The winner of two major Japanese literary awards (the Yamamoto Shugoro Prize and the Naoki Prize), he currently lives in Tokyo with his wife.