Afterword
Good afternoon. Honobu Yonezawa here.
I was inspired to write this volume after first seeing Michael Z. Lewin’s book, Type-A Girl, although I suppose that’s only its name in Japan. More accurately, it’s called Ask the Right Question.
When I initially saw the Japanese title, I thought, “What could this possibly be about?” and the mystery I imagined formed the basis for this volume. (The novel turned out to be entirely different from what I had imagined. It was still a great read, however.)
Additionally, I had Stephen King’s The Long Walk in mind as I was designing it as well. When I read it for the first time a long time ago, it was so scary and had such an impact on me that I couldn’t put it down, so it was probably only natural that it continued to float around in my head as I was writing this book.
I realized, however, that there was a decisive difference between his book and mine from the very get-go.
The Long Walk’s protagonist had companions while walking.
In this book, the protagonist walked alone.
There’s nothing I could’ve done about that. If he was going to be walking the Marathon Event, there was no way he would have been able to match his pace with others.
Now then, I hope that the story of the Classics Club will be able to reach you next time as well.
Thank you very much.
April, 2012
Honobu Yonezawa