Sakura Mori holds the “Book list for building lasting peace,” with books featured in the list laid out in front of her, in Osaka on July 11, 2026. (Mainichi/Kensuke Yaoi)
OSAKA — Booksellers across Japan have put together a “Book list for building lasting peace,” recommending titles for thinking about peace. The project was driven by concern that the intensity of media coverage and public interest surrounding war and peace in 2025, the 80th anniversary of the end of World War II, might be fading this year, the 81st.
In 2025, reporting on war and peace increased, related books were published and some bookstores set up special sections. Wondering whether that momentum had waned this year, two people who sell books at a shared bookstore in Osaka decided they had to do something.
One is Sakura Mori, 34, who rents a shelf at Kibo o Tsumugu Honya-san (the bookstore weaving hope), a shared bookstore in Osaka’s Asahi Ward, and sells books she has selected under the name Suika no Tane Bunko.
As attacks continue in the Gaza Strip despite a ceasefire agreement following Israel’s large-scale military offensive, Mori has shown solidarity with Palestinians by filling her shelves with books that encourage readers to reflect on peace.
In February, a preemptive strike on Iran by the United States and Israel disrupted supply chains. Even potato chip packages around Mori were redesigned in black and white as shortages took their toll, and anti-war demonstrations began. While taking part in the protests, Mori also felt a sense of discomfort. “Why am I speaking out only now, when my own life has been affected?” she wondered.
Japan has not been at war for 81 years. Yet U.S. forces stationed in Japan have taken part in conflicts around the world from bases including those in Okinawa. Mori reflected, “Haven’t we simply chosen to look away, even as others have borne sacrifices on our behalf?” She came to aspire to a form of peace that requires no one’s sacrifice.
Reading makes the world better
The person who resonated with Mori’s ideas was Hina, an office worker who runs the Furitsuzumi Tenkodo shelf at the same shared bookstore. Sharing Mori’s concern for Palestine, she had been developing the idea of creating a book list of works needed to build peace.
Hina believed that books could bring readers closer to the lives of strangers and to distant countries, while also helping them understand the circumstances and histories behind wars and conflicts.
The two believe that reading can make the world a better place.
After discussing the idea, they reached out through social media to bookstores across Japan that might be interested in participating. They received encouraging responses, such as, “As a bookseller, I wasn’t sure what I could do,” and “I never realized there was a way to share a message like this.” In the end, store owners from 45 distinctive bookstores across the country, from Hokkaido to Okinawa, recommended books for the project.
The recommended titles are wide-ranging. They include novels such as Erich Kastner’s “The Flying Classroom” and George Orwell’s “Nineteen Eighty-Four”; war memoirs by manga artist Shigeru Mizuki, who served on the South Pacific front during World War II; a picture book depicting the journey of a family that lost their father in war; and books on history education in South Korea and on atomic bomb survivors. Hina chose “The Dawn of Everything: A New History of Humanity,” co-authored by an anthropologist and an archaeologist.
The list is 33 pages in A5 format. Its cover features illustrations related to Palestine, including a donkey and a watermelon.
The two produced 2,000 copies at their own expense and distributed them to the participating bookstores. “Peace is created through the accumulation of thinking for yourself and exchanging views with others,” Mori said. “I hope the book list will serve as a starting point for that.” A list of participating bookstores is available at https://note.com/freegaza_13 (in Japanese).
(Japanese original by Kensuke Yaoi, Osaka City News Department)