Around midnight, under a lonely streetlamp in a provincial town in Japan, lies a white woman, a blonde, alone, robbed of all four limbs yet undead. Indeed, a rumor's been circulating among the local girls that a vampire has come to their backwater, of all places.

Koyomi Araragi, who prefers to avoid having friends because they'd lower his "intensity as a human", is naturally skeptical. Yet it is to him that the bloodsucking demon, a concept "dated twice over", beckons on the first day of spring break as he makes his way home with a fresh loot of morally compromising periodicals.

Always disarmingly candid, often hilariously playful, and sometimes devastatingly moving, KIZUMONOGATARI: Wound Tale is the perfect gateway into the world of author NISIOISIN, the best-selling young novelist in Japan today. The prequel to BAKEMONOGATARI ("Monster Tale"), this is where the legendary MONOGATARI series, whose anime adaptations have enjoyed international popularity and critical acclaim, begins.