Hope I'm in for a good time, I thought. Even if it's just for tonight. Set in the underground bar and club scene of 1970s Tokyo, Set My Heart On Fire tells the story of Izumi in her turbulent twenties.

Through a series of disarmingly frank vignettes, author Izumi Suzuki presents an unforgettable portrait of a young woman encountering missteps and miscommunication, good music and unreliable men, powerful drugs and disorientating meds. Izumi usually keeps her relationships short but complicated, until she meets Jun. Set My Heart on Fire is a visceral novel about...