Sleeping on Paper Boats, Vol. 1

A cursed screen-writing prodigy with a poisoned pen is pulled out of his drunken stupor by a fresh-faced amateur photographer who gives his life new meaning.

A young screenwriter who has skyrocketed to success on the back of his groundbreaking writing abilities discovers his pen is poisoned when all the people he has based his characters on meet untimely deaths. When a new love interest sparks his creativity, will he risk further misfortune or retire his pen forever?

Kei Kitahara, a visionary screenwriter who has taken postwar Japan by storm, has made the difficult decision to lay down his pen for good after he realises the people he’s been basing his characters on have all met unfortunate ends. He spends his days in misery, waiting to die, until a reason to live finds him in the gutter, too drunk and beaten to move.

Kei can’t help but be attracted to his saviour’s bewitching innocence, and the urge to write about him grows stronger by the day. Knowing he can’t take the risk, he vows never to use his pen against him, but will temptation prove too great?

Sleeping on Paper Boats, Vol. 1 by Teki Yatsuda explores the tension between creative inspiration and the dark consequences that sometimes follow.