Mieko Kawakami¡¯s literary star continues to rise. Not only is the writer currently shortlisted for an International Booker Prize for her novel ¡°Heaven,¡± the English translation of her book on the universality of loneliness, ¡°All the Lovers in the Night,¡± was released this week.

In elegantly spare prose, Kawakami imagines love as light, exploring the concept as both a particle and a wave: an individual glint of connection that is quickly extinguished, a surge of feeling that relentlessly engulfs and consumes.

All The Lovers In The Night, by Mieko KawakamiTranslated by Sam Bett and David Boyd224 pagesPICADOR