> Skip to content
  • Published: 2 February 2021
  • ISBN: 9780241454619
  • Imprint: Penguin Classics
  • Format: Paperback
  • Pages: 192
  • RRP: $26.00

Secret Rendezvous




A Kafaesque marvel and a biting satire of bureaucracy, medicine and modern life

In Tokyo, in the middle of the night, an uncalled-for ambulance arrives to spirit away a man's wife, though she is perfectly healthy. He sets out on an epic journey to find her, around the labyrinthine corners of a strange and enormous hospital. Days into his search, having encountered countless strange characters, odd sexual experiments and the unmistakable feeling of being watched, he is suddenly appointed to be the hospital's chief of security, and his new boss is convinced that he is a horse. Throughout it all, he will never stop searching for his wife.

  • Published: 2 February 2021
  • ISBN: 9780241454619
  • Imprint: Penguin Classics
  • Format: Paperback
  • Pages: 192
  • RRP: $26.00

Also by Kobo Abe

See all

Praise for Secret Rendezvous

A disconcertingly funny book . . . both original and edgily entertaining

The New York Times Book Review

Vivid and spooky

Kirkus Reviews

Original and edgily entertaining. It confirms Abe as the best Japanese novelist (along with Shusaku Endo) since the deaths of Yukio Mishima and Yasunari Kawabata.

The New York Times