"Where did you come from before you were born to our house?" eight-year-old Katsugoro asked his brother and sister. To his surprise, neither of them remembered a previous life as he did.

In this book, the linguist and parapsychologist Ohkado Masayuki examines in depth this important 19th century case suggestive of reincarnation, alongside numerous contemporary accounts of Japanese children claiming to remember past lives. Uniquely, the author also explores cases of children who remember the state between lives, and sometimes even the deaths of their former personalities and the transition to a new life. Such accounts bear striking similarities to descriptions of near-death experiences.

In still other cases, children recount memories before conception, and between conception and birth, often without associated memories of past lives. Ohkado argues that the accumulated evidence strongly suggests that human consciousness survives bodily death and continues to exist from one body to another. This book demonstrates that the little ones around you are conscious spiritual beings, who may have had profound extraordinary experiences.

The Katsugoro case, together with similar examples found all over the world, inspired the work of Dr. Ian Stevenson of the University of Virginia. With its thorough research and engaging analysis, Ohkado Masayuki's Katsugoro and Other Reincarnation Cases in Japan is an important new contribution to the body of data suggesting the reality of reincarnation phenomena.