Toudo no Tabibito

An anthology of six short stories: 1) *The Ice Wanderer* (Toudo no Tabibito - 凍土の旅人) [2003] Set in the Klondike region in 1897, and recounts the American author Jack London’s fortuitous encounter with an enigmatic old man. 2) *White Wilderness* (Shiroi Kouya - 白い荒野) [2003] Also related to Jack London - it's an adaptation of the early part of his novel *White Fang*, in which two men and their team of dogs are relentlessly pursued by a pack of wolves. 3) *Our Mountains* (Yama e - 山へ) [2002] Set in 1920s Japan, the story follows an elderly hunter in his attempts to take vengeance on the enormous bear that killed his son. 4) *Kaiyose-Jima* (貝寄風島) [2004] A nostalgic tale in which a boy is sent to spend the summer with relatives on the coast after his mother is taken ill. 5) *Shôkarô* (松華樓) [1998] A mangaka looks back on the strange apartment building he lived in when he first came to Tokyo as an aspiring artist and the unusual people he met there. 6) *Return To The Sea* (Umi e Kaeru - 海へ還る) [1994] The tale of a marine biologist working on the coast of Alaska who becomes obsessed with an elderly bowhead whale and the Inuit tales of a whale cemetery.