I’ve been pretty quiet on this blog for the past few months, but that’s because I’ve been very busy behind the scenes with several of big projects and exhibitions that weren’t ready to be made public. Fortunately I am able to share one of them now!

This July, I have a new book coming out here in Japan, published by Kasama Shoin. The World’s Most Beautiful Yokai is a bilingual English-Japanese book featuring 60 some of my most popular yokai illustrations over the past 16 years. The yokai have been selected from my 5 published yokai encyclopedias, as well as several that have not yet been published in any book.

Readers of my other encyclopedias will be familiar with the format, which divides the yokai into six chapters based on location: houses, cities, fields, mountains, seas and rivers, and the otherworld. Each yokai is accompanied by a description in both Japanese and English, so it’s a great choice for yokai fans who are also studying a foreign language!

You can read more about the book at Kasama Shoin’s website, and you can pre-order it now from Amazon, or pick it up at your local book store this July.