Haruka Tono so far

Haruka Tono (b. 1991) has become an indelible part of my literary landscape. I posted about the three books he's written so far on FB, so I decided to copy-paste that here:

1. 破局 (The breakup)
Won him the Akutagawa Prize last year. Really splits opinions; some people think it's too uncritical of toxic masculinity or find it pointless, etc. I was totally fascinating; sex is a mystery and I like books that examine it. What's the line between toxic and not? The women in this book aren't perfect angels, either, and yet it's a book about toxic masculinity? This and all of his other books are great in that the more you talk about them with other people, the better they get.

 
2. 改良 (Improvement)
His Bungei Prize–winning debut (but I read it after 破局). This is a difficult read and reminded me of Hiroka Yamashita's クロス (Cross) in that it deals with crossdressing, sexuality, identity, and so on in a way that people may not be happy or satisfied with. But that also makes it very interesting (although I worry lots of people lack the basic knowledge on these topics to understand properly, to be honest). Will be extremely triggering for some due to transmisogyny, sexual violence, etc. What does it mean to be beautiful? What does the title imply? There's a lot to think about here, too.

 
3. 教育 (Education; not pictured)
Was published this past summer in 文藝 and nominated for the Noma Literary New Face Prize. This is considered a full-length novel, while the others are more novella-sized. His subtle world-building really draws you into this hyper-sexual dystopia where students at a school cultivating supernatural powers are encouraged to orgasm three times a day to raise their grades. The story mainly follows the male protagonist's relationships with the different girls he encounters. There are a handful of stories within the story: 1) The protagonist is in Translation Club, so you get to read excerpts of the surreal novel he is translating, called Velociraptor. 2) He meets a girl from Hypnotism Club and during one of his sessions, the story becomes about a middle-aged woman working at an amusement park. 3) The girl he likes the most is in Theater Club and writes a bizarre play. You get to "see" the whole thing (Strawberry People come to attack all the Welsh Corgis, so people have to surrender their pets to a police facility). Totally different scale than his first two books, and more surreal than I could have ever expected. The end is as infuriating as it is tragic. I'll definitely be buying it when it gets published in book form early next year.