Naraku no Hoshi

Early twentieth-century Japan. Subaru Karasuma once dreamed of making his name as a writer, but those ambitions have long since crumbled, and now he finds himself drowning in debts he has no hope of ever repaying. Convinced that his miserable existence has run its course, he resolves to bring his life to an end. Yet fate intervenes before he can carry out his dark intent. His attention is seized by a neighbor frantically scrambling alongside a literary group, racing against the clock to complete a manuscript commissioned by Geppo Yagira—a wealthy, celebrated novelist whose fierce talent is matched only by his devilish good looks. In that chance encounter, the course of Subaru's life is quietly, irrevocably altered. When the magnetic Geppo sets his eyes on Subaru, a new chapter opens for the failed writer—one he never could have foreseen. But the path now stretching out before him offers no promise of salvation. Step by step, it seems to draw him ever deeper into darkness, perhaps further down than even the despair he had sought to escape.