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Kenny Fries embarks on a journey of profound self-discovery as a disabled foreigner in Japan, a society historically hostile to difference. As he visits gardens, experiences Noh and butoh, and meets artists and scholars, he also discovers disabled gods, one-eyed samurai, blind chanting priests, and A-bomb survivors. When he is diagnosed as HIV positive, all his assumptions about Japan, the body, and mortality are shaken, and he must find a way to reenter life on new terms.



About the Author

Kenny Fries

Kenny Fries received the Creative Capital literature grant for In the Province of the Gods. He is the author of The History of My Shoes and the Evolution of Darwin's Theory, recipient of the Outstanding Book Award from the Gustavus Myers Center for the Study of Bigotry and Human Rights, and Body, Remember: A Memoir. He edited Staring Back: The Disability Experience from the Inside Out and was commissioned by Houston Grand Opera to write the libretto for The Memory Stone. His books of poems include In the Gardens of Japan, Anesthesia, and Desert Walking. Twice a Fulbright Scholar (to Germany and Japan) , he was a Creative Arts Fellow of the Japan/US Friendship Commission and the National Endowment for the Arts, and has received grants from the DAAD (German Academic Exchange) , Canada Council for the Arts, Ontario Arts Council, and Toronto Arts Council. He teaches in the MFA in Creative Writing Program at Goddard College.



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