“My first clown design for Lina’s umbrella handle seems to have been too scary! At the publisher's request, I made it cute it in an American style.”
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| ©︎ Miho Satake |
Speaking to a children’s newspaper this past summer, Miho Satake shared about illustrating The Village Beyond the Mist, my translation of Kiri no mukō no fushigi na machi by Sachiko Kashiwaba for Restless Books.
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| Portion of article in the Asahi Shogakusei Shimbun, 31 July 2025. Satake is shown at left. |
Before the US edition, Village came out in various Japanese editions published by Kodansha over some 50 years—including an English translation released domestically. The Kodansha editions have featured illustrations by Kozaburo (Ko) Takekawa, Hiromi Sugita, and Kyotaro Aoki. (Each has had a unique take on the umbrella handle!)
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| Screenshot of two Sugita covers and two Takekawa covers at the Kodansha website. Kodansha.co.jp/book/products/0000209785 |
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| ©︎ Kyotaro Aoki. Interior illustration from a 2014 reissue of the 1987 Christopher Holmes translation, from Illustrator Kyotaro's website. information.kyotaro.biz/?eid=993048 |
When Restless decided to publish Village in the US, they also chose to commission Satake, the illustrator of the first Kashiwaba novel they ever published: Temple Alley Summer.
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| ©︎ Miho Satake |
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| ©︎ Miho Satake |
I loved translating Temple while enjoying Satake’s manga-style illustrations of the main story, set in Japan, and her captivating silhouette illustrations of an embedded high fantasy story. The main story is printed on white pages and the embedded story on gray pages, heightening the visual contrast.
When booktalking Temple I always plug Satake’s cover, too, with its contemporary Japanese schoolchild in the foreground (complete with randoseru backpack) and witch on a broom in the background. It sums up the story in a heartbeat.
Surely, Satake’s art in Temple helped it find a home at Restless, which in turn helped Kashiwaba become published in the US. Satake is known in Japan for illustrating a range of globally known titles, from Howl’s Moving Castle by Diana Wynne Jones to three books in the Kiki’s Delivery Service series by Eiko Kadono. Satake's openness to world styles plus love of home has earned her fans everywhere.
I am grateful too for illustrations with a high "window" quotient, which show readers a Japan they might not otherwise encounter. Such are Yukiko Saito’s eerie evocations of Kashiwaba’s The House of the Lost on the Cape: one of few novels available in English about the 2011 Tohoku earthquake and tsunami that was written by a Tohoku resident.
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| ©︎ Yukiko Saito |
Saito’s illustrations of region-specific dwellings, objects, and characters from folklore helped me picture what I was translating in Cape when I could not go to Tohoku for research, due to Covid-era border restrictions.
Finally, one illustrator has made all of my Kashiwaba translations possible: Naomi Kojima. As a fellow member of the SCBWI Japan regional team at the time of the Tohoku disaster, Naomi took a chance and introduced me to Tohoku writer Sachiko Kashiwaba, that I might translate one of her stories for Tomo, a benefit anthology edited by then-regional advisor Holly Thompson. Holly wrote about Tomo last month here on the SCBWI blog. After Tomo, I continued working with Kashiwaba's writing.
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| SCBWI Japan regional team at the time of Tomo; Naomi is at left. |
Naomi Kojima is herself an illustrator with both US and Japan ties and experience, who has illustrated books published on both sides of the Pacific. Her oeuvre includes multiple novels by Kashiwaba for the publishing house Kaiseisha.
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| From top: Great-Aunt's Amazing Recipes and Princess Tapir and Her Classmates by Sachiko Kashiwaba, illustrated by Naomi Kojima |
Naomi’s inimitable illustrations also grace Lifelong Favorites, a website where the Japan Foundation recommends 59 children’s books for prioritized support through grants to overseas publishers. The grant program also supports publication of many other Japanese children’s and young adult books in translation, my projects included.
Illustrations and illustrators, together with authors, have helped make my translation journey a reality and a rich one. Here’s to cross-vocational community bringing the world to children’s bookshelves!
Avery Fischer Udagawa’s translations include the 2022 Batchelder Award-winning novel Temple Alley Summer, the 2024 Batchelder Honor book The House of the Lost on the Cape, and new release The Village Beyond the Mist, all authored in Japanese by Sachiko Kashiwaba. Avery works in international education north of Bangkok and volunteers as SCBWI Global Translator Coordinator.
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