The very title "Men Without Women" contains the motif and key idea of all the novellas: the main characters are men who, due to various circumstances, have been left by women, who have lost the love of their life or never achieved it. According to Mitsuyoshi Numano, professor at the University of Tokyo: "After reading these stories, a 'blues' melancholy lingers subconsciously from the impossibility for women and men, even the closest ones, to fully understand each other's souls. Modern people, having lost faith in gods and their own purpose, have developed a so-called 'organ of loneliness' that helps them lie even to those they love with all their heart, and many are simply unable to get rid of this product of spiritual mutation." "Becoming men without women is very easy. It is enough to love a woman deeply, and then she disappears somewhere. In most cases, they are kidnapped by cunning sailors. They sweet-talk the girls and quickly take them away to Marseille or the Ivory Coast. And we cannot do anything about it. Or maybe they end their lives without connection to sailors. We can't do anything about that either. Not only we — even the sailors." The collection includes the story "Drive My Car," whose screen adaptation became the film of the year according to the National Society of Film Critics in the USA. This film made the Oscar Shortlist in the category "Best International Film."