Somehow, Crystal

Somehow, Crystal (なんとなく、クリスタル, Nantonaku, Kurisutaru) is a Japanese novel by Yasuo Tanaka. Published in magazine form as the winner of the 17th Bungei Prize in 1980, it was also nominated for the Akutagawa Prize, and published in book form by Kawade Shobō Shinsha in 1981. A bestseller shortly after publication, the novel was controversial among contemporary critics for its apparent glorification of luxury consumption and its use of extensive annotations to identify desirable real-world products, brands, services, and locations encountered by the book's fictional characters. Academic critics have since identified Somehow, Crystal as an early and important example of Japanese postmodern literature. The book has been translated into Korean, German, and English, and a Japanese film adaptation was released by Shochiku in 1981.