The Ghosts of Okuma: A Love Story - Paperback

by Mitch Wieland (Author)

At La Jolla High, Wyatt Roth is the shy geek with a missing sister and a mother lost to suicide. His agoraphobic father, Stewart, spends his days scouring the internet for any trace of his daughter. When Wyatt learns that his sister is modeling in Tokyo, the pair fly to Japan-- but Stewart suffers a crippling panic attack in Shinjuku Station, leaving Wyatt to navigate the city alone. In the neon-lit streets, Wyatt befriends Yoshimi Watanabe, a fiercely defiant Fukushima refugee whose nightly graffiti protests the evacuation of her home. Together, they venture into the abandoned towns and haunting landscapes of the Fukushima exclusion zone, confronting grief, injustice, and the fragile possibility of hope. The Ghosts of Okuma is a luminous story of courage, connection, and the lengths we will go to reclaim what has been lost.

Author Biography

Mitch Wieland is the author of the novels Willy Slater's Lane and God's Dogs. His short stories have appeared in The Missouri Review, The Southern Review, The Best of the West, and The Kenyon Review, among other publications. He's been awarded grants from the National Endowment for the Arts, the Christopher Isherwood Foundation, and the Idaho Commission on the Arts. Wieland is the current Writer in Residence for the state of Idaho.