A housewife finds herself haunted by visions of a mushroom cloud. She abruptly leaves her husband and son to travel alone to the city of Nagasaki, where she soon begins an affair with a young Russian-Japanese man.

Inspired by Marguerite Duras’s screenplay for “Hiroshima, Mon Amour,” this novel is an undeniable demonstration of Kashimada’s distinctive voice, the polish and precision of her literary style, and her dedication to plumbing the depths of her characters’ psychology.

Thrilling and poised in equal measure, dealing with the travails of history, with gendered identity, and with the tension between private and public selves, Love at Six Thousand Degrees is a literary highwire act by one of the most unique voices in contemporary Japanese fiction.