We are pleased to bring you a full story from PANDORA: The Receding Sound of Footsteps, a forthcoming collection of short works by Hagiwara Rei. The book is due for release in April 2023, and can be ordered via its crowdfunding campaign. The publisher, Glacier Bay Books, has this to say:
Surface and Prayer 『地面と祈り』
by Hagiwara Rei"Surface and Prayer" is one of five stories to be published in Hagiwara Rei's forthcoming collection PANDORA: The Receding Sound of Footsteps.
PANDORA is Hagiwara Rei's masterpiece. Rei is a comic artist based in Japan who has self-published their work at Comita through the domestic indie manga scene since 2018. Born in 1993, Rei first become more widely known to English language readers Fall of 2020 through the Glacier Bay Books publication of their sparse and emotionally resonant debut Ripples.
PANDORA expands on this with their second long form work, a lyrical, full-color 264 page collection of five stories. Painted in delicate watercolors during 2020/2021 and the initial throes of the COVID-19 pandemic, PANDORA simultaneously reflects on current events as well as the 10th anniversary of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster.
Gorgeous and direct, these stories tenderly reach into your very heart of hearts. Hagiwara Rei masterfully paints the elliptical nature of life and loss in the present time, depicting five scenes of the grief and hope to be found in the modern age.
Edited by Emuh Ruh. Translation by zhuchka. Typesetting by Tim Sun.
* * *
