Life Ceremony

She believes she's an extraterrestrial disguised as a human.

In July, Murata published Life Ceremony, a new story collection in which she concocts grotesque social rituals.

In the title story, funerals are occasions to eat the dead, to expose the absurdity of the corporeal norms we've all become desensitized to.

Though she is unlikely to use either term, Murata's fiction might best be described as speculative feminist.

But Murata's work evades such easy categorization.

Her fiction, rather than circumscribing the pleasures of intimacy, widens its possibilities.

Life Ceremony, Murata's new collection, includes a few short, sweet stories about platonic friendships and relationships with non-human forms.

In one, two elderly women, one a virgin and one promiscuous, platonically raise a family together.

I think a lot of Japanese translated fiction fits perfectly into this.

Sayaka Murata is a pretty prolific author of freaky books and Convenience Store Woman and Life Ceremony are two that I've read by her that I think fit perfectly.

All the Lovers in the Night by Miyako Kawakami, Vladimir by Julia Mae Jones, The New Me by Halle Butler, Night Bitch by Rachel Yoder.

My Husband by Maud Ventura.