Treats from the Osaka Bakery

Koharu Ichikura loves working part-time at Nostimo, a busy independent bakery in Osaka. As a broke university student, getting to take home anything that hasn't sold by the end of the day is incredible. Could anything be better than a freezer full of croissants, choco cornets, curry bread and cinnamon rolls? Secretly, Koharu dreams of making it big as a manga artist. For now, she spends her days working at Nostimo shaping dough, neatly arranging baked goods on the shop floor... and solving all manner of everyday mysteries. Koharu has sharper eyes than most, and a love for piecing together clues. Everyone at Nostimo has their secrets, from the employees to the customers. And Koharu is determined to unravel them all, one delicious item at a time... A huge instant bestseller, Treats from the Osaka Bakery is the award-winning debut from Usagi Tsuchiya that has sold over three hundred thousand copies in Japan. It has been translated into English by Geoffrey Trousselot, who is best known for the Before the Coffee Gets Cold series.

Usagi Tsuchiya was born in Osaka and grew up in Tokyo. She was studying at Osaka University's Faculty of Engineering but, since dropping out, works as a manga assistant and artist. Her manga projects have placed runner up for the Shueisha Akatsuka Award and been a prize winner at the Ichijinsha Yurihime Comic Awards. Treats from the Osaka Bakery is her debut novel and won her the prestigious 'This Mystery is Amazing!' award. She used to work part-time at a bakery. Geoffrey Trousselot was born in Hobart, Australia, in 1969. He is the translator of the Before the Coffee Gets Cold series. Other translations include The I Wonder Bookstore by Shinsuke Yoshitake and Hiroshima: From the shadows of the grass by Toshinori Kanaya. He was a contributing translator to The 20th Century Art in Japan by the Tokyo Art Club.