Hashiru Jiisan is a novel by Yo Ikenaga about Sakutsugu, a 69-year-old man, and the ordinary life and unsettled desires of old age. Through his strange connection with a monkey that appears above his head, the story brings solitude, attachment to life, and distance within a family into view.

A monkey appears above Sakutsugu's head, beginning an unusual coexistence amid his ordinary old age.

Pan no Naru Umi, Hi no Mau Sora is a love story in which Maya, a lyricist who loves steel drums, and Gregory, a subway conductor, grow close by phone and arrange to meet in Trinidad and Tobago.

Beginning with a personal ad in New York, the pair's relationship leads toward the homeland of the steel drum.