Sparks of Tomorrow

The novel takes place in the summer of 1907, the 40th year of the Meiji era. 15-year-old Inako Momokawa lives in the Fushimi area of Kyoto, and is the second daughter of a sake brewer. Nothing she does ever comes out right, and she receives a scolding from her father every day. Her only relief is the trust she places in her prayers to the gods. One day while at Fushimi Inari shrine, she meets a freewheeling young man named Kihachi Sakamoto. He rejects the gods, and boasts of the incoming age of electricity. The topic of marriage suddenly comes up in Inako's household. Her father is one-sided…