Tales From the Cafe

Tales from the Café is the second book in Toshikazu Kawaguchi’s Before the Coffee Gets Cold series. It was first published in Japan in 2017, and English translations appeared in 2020 (UK) and 2021 (US). Kawaguchi began his career as a playwright, and Before the Coffee Gets Cold was adapted from a play that won the grand prize at the Suginami Drama Festival.

Tales from the Café is a contemporary Japanese magical realist novel. It is set in Funiculi Funicula, a Tokyo café where it is possible to travel to the past. The novel blends the everyday and the supernatural and subverts many time-travel tropes. For example, one of the rules is that no matter what one does in the past, the present does not change. Some of the novel’s key themes are Changing the Future Versus Changing the Self, Happiness as a Choice, and The Importance of Ritual.

This guide refers to the 2021 US Picador edition, translated by Geoffrey Trousselot.

Content Warning: The source text and this guide discuss suicide and pregnancy loss.

Plot Summary

Tales from the Café is the second novel in Kawaguchi’s Before the Coffee Gets Cold series.