“At the end of the day, whether one returns to the past or travels to the future, the present doesn’t change.”
Located in a small back alley in Tokyo is a coffee shop that has been brewing the same special blend for over a century. But this store also offers another remarkable experience: the ability to travel back in time. The only rules the customers have to follow are sitting in the same particular seat, not leaving the cafe and returning before the time their coffee gets cold. Toshikazu Kawaguchi’s Before the Coffee Gets Cold follows four visitors to the shop, all of whom travel back to their pasts with their hopes and goals. It is a beautiful and moving read that taps into the thought we’ve all had over what we would do if we could go back in time. Similar books to Before the Coffee Gets Cold also offer heart-warming and poignant explorations of grief and regret, as well as our search for happiness in the world. Join us today at What We Reading as we run through some of our favourite books like Before the Coffee Gets Cold!
Tales From The Cafe – Toshikazu Kawaguchi
Where better place to start in a list of the best books like Before the Coffee Gets Cold than with author Toshikazu Kawaguchi’s immediate sequel? In the second entry of the Before the Coffee Gets Cold series, Kawaguchi once again takes readers through Tokyo and Cafe Funiculi Funicula’s remarkable time-travelling offer.
As well as re-meeting some familiar faces from his 2015 book, readers meet four new customers, all of whom once again are looking to correct some of the biggest regrets from their lives. From the man who wants to see his best friend who died twenty-two years before to the person who travelled to see the girl he couldn’t marry, Kawaguchi once again tells a beautiful story of individuals who struggle to face the past to begin moving forward with a future.
Convenience Store Woman – Sayaka Murata
Sayaka Murata’s English-language debut novel, Convenience Store Woman, is a touching story about the pressures to conform that our peers and wider society apply to us. Like Before the Coffee Gets Cold, it tells the story of an individual living in Tokyo: Keiko Furukura. Keiko has never fit in until she begins working at the Hiiromachi branch of ‘Smile Mart’.
With all the norms of social etiquette laid out for her in the store’s manual, she begins copying everything from the uniform to the mannerisms of her colleagues, finally believing that she is behaving as a normal person does. That is until her family and friends begin pressuring her to get a husband and start a proper career, leading to Keiko taking desperate action. Ironic and sharp, Murata’s book remains one of the most original portraits of contemporary work life, as well as our collective urge to fit in at all times.
Sweet Bean Paste – Durian Sukegawa
In another book similar to Before the Coffee Gets Cold and one of the best pieces of modern Japanese literature, Durian Sukegawa introduces readers to Sentaro in his 2013 book, Sweet Bean Past. With a criminal record, an unhealthy drinking habit and his dreams of becoming a novelist up in smoke, he spends his days selling dorayaki, a pancake filled with sweet bean paste from his tiny confectionary store.
There, he encounters Tokue. An elderly woman with disfigured hands and a murky past, she makes the best sweet bean paste he has ever tasted. As she begins teaching Sentaro her techniques, a strong friendship develops between them. Yet, social pressures soon intervene and Tokue’s dark secret is revealed, with devastating consequences. Like Kawaguchi’s book, Sweet Bean Taste is an exploration of the burden of the past and the redemptive power of friendship.
Days At The Morisaki Bookshop – Satoshi Yagisawa
Nestled in Jimbocho, Tokyo’s famous book town, is a store filled with hundreds of second-hand books. Twenty-five-year-old Takako has never been one for reading, but the Morisaki bookshop has been in her family for three generations. Her uncle, Satoru, sees it as his pride and joy, throwing his entire life into it since his wife, Momoko, left him five years ago.
After her boyfriend suddenly announces he is marrying someone else, Takako reluctantly accepts her uncle’s offer to live rent-free in the tiny apartment above the bookshop. Keen to pass the time and begin mending her broken heart, she soon begins to find herself immersed in the many different worlds lining Morisaki Bookshop. And, as time continues to pass, Takako soon discovers that she and her uncle have far more in common than they first thought. As well as being one of the best books for book lovers everywhere, Days at the Morisaki Bookshop is a lesson about life and love, similar to Before the Coffee Gets Cold.
The Housekeeper And The Professor – Yoko Ogawa
In Yoko Ogawa’s The Housekeeper and the Professor, readers are introduced to a brilliant math professor with a strange problem – since sustaining a head injury, he can only remember eighty minutes’ worth of short-term memory. They also meet the young housekeeper with a ten-year-old son who is hired to take care of him.
As the pair are routinely introduced to one another anew every morning, a peculiar and beautiful connection soon begins to blossom between them. Whilst he can’t keep a hold of his memories for long, the professor has a wealth of age-old equations that help him capture the many wonders of the everyday. Enchanting and accomplished in its delivery, The Housekeeper and the Professor is another book like Before the Coffee Gets Cold that delves into what it means to live in the present.
If Cats Disappeared From The World – Genki Kawamura
Isolated from his family and living alone with his cat, the narrator in Genki Kawamura’s If Cats Disappeared from the World knows he only has months left to live. However, before he can set to work ticking off his bucket list, the Devil appears with a bizarre offer: if he can make one thing in the world disappear, he will grant the narrator an extra day of life.
Similar to Before the Coffee Gets Cold, Kawamura’s book is about loss, reconciliation and the discovery of the things that really matter in modern life. Funny, tear-jerking and delivered in a way that makes even the biggest of questions easy to read, the adventures of the narrator and his beloved cat, Cabbage, are sure to get readers thinking about what it is that makes their life worth living.
The Invisible Life Of Addie LaRue – V.E. Schwab
Another book like Before the Coffee Gets Cold that deals in Faustian bargains and time manipulation comes from V.E. Schwab in The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue. Whisking readers back to France in 1714, the story follows Addie LaRue, a woman who makes a pact to live forever, only to be cursed to be forgotten by everyone she meets.
What follows is a dazzling story spanning centuries and continents where this young woman encounters some of the most enigmatic and interesting characters, but without ever being able to leave an imprint on history. But, everything changes when, after nearly three centuries, Addie happens upon a young man in a hidden bookstore who happens to remember her name…
The Miracles Of The Namiya General Store – Keigo Higashino
Keigo Higashino’s The Miracles of the Namiya General Store follows three young delinquents who hide out in an abandoned store following their latest robbery. To their surprise, however, a small letter drops through the mail slot in the shop’s shutter. This one moment then proceeds to take the three on a journey of epic self-discovery across a single night, stepping into the shoes of the kind-hearted shopkeeper who spent his final years offering his thoughts to those who wrote to him.
Through the lens of time, the three share their insights with those seeking guidance and, by the time the sun rises, none of their lives will ever be the same again. Like Before the Coffee Gets Cold, Higashiro’s beloved work is another touching Japanese read that explores the magical mysteries of time and the power of connection.
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Part-time reader, part-time rambler, and full-time Horror enthusiast, James has been writing for What We Reading since 2022. His earliest reading memories involved Historical Fiction, Fantasy and Horror tales, which he has continued to take with him to this day. James’ favourite books include The Last (Hanna Jameson), The Troop (Nick Cutter) and Chasing The Boogeyman (Richard Chizmar).
