Convenience Store Woman by Sayaka Murata

For this book club, I’d like to suggest a story about a woman who is simply trying to live in a way that will make society leave her alone. As usual, it doesn’t quite work out.

Convenience Store Woman has been described by The Guardian as “a deadpan Japanese tale of an oddball shop assistant that possesses a strange beauty”. What struck me, though, was not its strangeness but its calm. Unexpectedly, the book helped me find reassurance in routine itself—in small, unnoticed actions, and in the permission to exist sometimes as a function, sometimes as a fictional character.

I hope you are intrigued by now. If not, I would still encourage you to pick up Convenience Store Woman by Sayaka Murata— it is quite short! —and to join our discussion, where we will reflect together on questions of normality, meaning in work, and the fragile line between individuality and conformity.
Links for inspiration:
Convenience Store Woman by Sayaka Murata review – sublimely weird
https://www.theguardian.com/books/2018/aug/07/convenience-store-woman-sayaka-murata-review