Blind Willow, Sleeping Woman: Stories [Paperback]

The twenty-four stories that make upBlind Willow, Sleeping Womangenerously express the incomparable Haruki Murakami’s mastery of the form.

Here are animated crows, a criminal monkey, and an ice man, as well as the dreams that shape us and the things we might wish for. From the surreal to the mundane, these stories exhibit Murakami’s ability to transform the full range of human experience in ways that are instructive, surprising, and entertaining.

A warning to new readers of Haruki Murakami: You will become addicted. . . . His newest collection is as enigmatic and sublime as ever. —San Francisco Chronicle

“Whimsical, magical, daring or sometimes played with the mute in the bell of the trumpet. . . . The best of these linger far beyond the reading of them.” —Chicago Tribune

“Murakami’s writing perfectly captures the way surreal, even seemingly supernatural, encounters can subtly alter the terrain of everyday life.” —Washington Post Book World

“This collection shows Murakami at his dynamic, organic best. . . . InBlind Willow, Sleeping Woman, Murakami demonstrates brilliantly the perils of trying to squeeze life into prefabricated compartments.” —Los Angeles Times Book Review

Haruki Murakamiwas born in Kyoto in 1949 and now lives near Tokyo. His work has been translated into more than fifty languages, and the most recent of his many honors is the Yomiuri Literary Prize, whose previous recipients include Yukio Mishima, Kenzaburo Oe, and Kobo Abe.

Blind Willow, Sleeping WomanWhen I closed my eyes, the scent of the wind wafted up toward me. A May wind, swelling up like a piece of fruit, with a rough outer skin, slimy flesh, dozens of seeds. The flesh split open in midair, spraying seeds like gentle buckshot into the bare skin of my arms, leaving behind a faint tracelÛ