Sayaka Murata

Natsuki isn't like the other girls. She has a wand and a transformation mirror. She might be a witch, or an alien from another planet. Together with her cousin Yuu, Natsuki spends her summers in the wild mountains of Nagano, dreaming of other worlds. When a terrible sequence of events threatens to part the two children forever, they make a promise: survive, no matter what.

Now Natsuki is grown. She lives a quiet life with her asexual husband, surviving as best she can by pretending to be normal. But the demands of Natsuki's family are increasing, her friends wonder why she's still not pregnant, and dark shadows from Natsuki's childhood are pursuing her. Fleeing the suburbs for the mountains of her childhood, Natsuki prepares herself with a reunion with Yuu. Will he still remember their promise? And will he help her keep it?

Earthlings

gabriella

Klara Hansen 

Mari-Claire Parrin

absolutely no words to describe what i have just read. there are themes of cannibalism, child abuse, murder, sexual assault, and incest. it’s not something i’d wish anyone to read but unfortunately it's so well-written.

jungmi

vivien

𓆨

i'm not sure whether to give this a two stars rate or three but what i'm sure of is that i really really like sayaka's writing and i can't stress enough how relatable her characters/writing is and i know it's kinda dumb to say that she's so realistic but oh well, this is probably the darkest dark comedy i've ever laid my hands on(since i watched the death of stalin that is), and the abusive parts were too much for me to swallow it made me so uncomfortable but unfortunately they're realistic,it has some unnecessary stuff going on too so two stars had to go.
this is a huge TW so whenever you feel like you just can't keep on reading don't hesitate this is not for anyone.

Initial reaction: cute cover & aliens? This will be fun! 😇✌️😙

Unhinged and not for the faint of heart. Similar vibes as Oyasimni Punpun & Homunculus. Need to read a cheesy romance to cleansed my palette.

Cristina S

Initial reaction: cute cover & aliens? This will be fun! 😇✌️😙

Me: 😧😶🫨✝️

Unhinged and not for the faint of heart. Similar vibes as Oyasimni Punpun & Homunculus. Need to read a cheesy romance to cleansed my palette.



From the beloved author of cult sensation Convenience Store Woman, which has now sold more than one million copies worldwide and has been translated into thirty-three languages, comes a spellbinding and otherworldly novel about a woman who believes she is an alien Sayaka Murata’s Convenience Store Woman was one of the most unusual and refreshing bestsellers of recent years, depicting the life of a thirty-six-year-old clerk in a Tokyo convenience store. Now, in Earthlings, Sayaka Murata pushes at the boundaries of our ideas of social conformity in this brilliantly imaginative, intense, and absolutely unforgettable novel. As a child, Natsuki doesn’t fit in with her family. Her parents favor her sister, and her best friend is a plush toy hedgehog named Piyyut, who talks to her. He tells her that he has come from the planet Popinpobopia on a special quest to help her save the Earth. One summer, on vacation with her family and her cousin Yuu in her grandparents’ ramshackle wooden house in the mountains of Nagano, Natsuki decides that she must be an alien, which would explain why she can’t seem to fit in like everyone else. Later, as a grown woman, living a quiet life with her asexual husband, Natsuki is still pursued by dark shadows from her childhood, and decides to flee the “baby factory” of society for good, searching for answers about the vast and frightening mysteries of the universe—answers only Natsuki has the power to uncover. Dreamlike, sometimes shocking, and always strange and wonderful, Earthlings asks what it means to be happy in a stifling world, and cements Sayaka Murata’s status as a master chronicler of the outsider experience and our own uncanny universe.

A Novel

3.5 stars

(view spoiler)[when natsuki said, “sometimes i thought being a popinpobopian was effectively a mental illness that i had needed in order to protect myself, and the only way i would ever recover was by becoming a slave of the factory.” I WAS LIKE ??? GIRL YOU ARE ACTUALLY MENTALLY ILL… WDYM. (hide spoiler)]


  trigger warnings include - incest, cannibalism, rape, alien themes and murder.


this book was really tough for me to read due to the incest and rape themes which i hate, but oddly enough, i found myself not being able to stop reading. 

initially, i thought they might really be (view spoiler)[aliens (hide spoiler)], but as i got deeper, i realized that they weren’t and things got even weirder. 

essentially, i think the main idea revolves around resisting society's expectations, but the author takes it to a different level. 

also, natsuki’s childhood experiences were too traumatic which is why i kinda understand why she became that way… (by the way, mr igasaki deserved what happened to him IDGAF. i wished natsuki’s mother also got what she deserved, cause that abusive motherf-cker made my blood boil just as much)

Archiell

Cait🪼

It's very rare for me to finish a book in one sitting, let alone in just a few hours, but Earthlings was a wonderful exception. This was nothing like I'd expected and I loved it so much - undoubtedly the best and most perplexing novel I've read all year!

i appreciate how she talked about asexuality in her novel but??i think i'm also easily disturbed. idk. this is how i'm gonna describe the feeling of reading this book: you'd wanted to try ayahuasca, you wanted the spiritual journey people always talking about, but instead, you got cheap crack and now your brain hurts

speechless I think I recommend ? I think I liked it ? Ask me again in a few days I have to recover and react first

jillian tenner

azliana aziz

meh. ott + all over the place. interesting stuffs, unexciting read.

Farah Aisha Shabrina

maybe the most fucked up book i've ever read—but also one of the most well executed ones. sayaka murata, the writer you are!

alice

syadrina

i wonder if david lynch can do a collab with her

First and foremost: this is a very biased review because I love Sayaka Murata’s works. Earthlings in particular left me with the biggest impression because I just find the story to be ridiculously insane. The premise itself is already crazy but the book… the book is another level of mindfuckery for me. Natsuki is a very interesting main character. She’s imaginative and whimsical, always maintain a childlike personality even after she grew up. One thing that stood out the most though, is her stubbornness. Natsuki has this strong belief (that she’s an alien) she wouldn’t let go. It’s both scary and fascinating at the same time, how someone could be 

What I love the most about Earthlings is how crazy it is packaged. With Natsuki thinking she’s an alien and other characters who are just as out-of-this-world to say the least. It could be translated into several different messages and I don’t know which one is the truest. It talks about how society expects everyone to be the same and want the same thing, about how people who are deemed as different will always be treated like an outcast. Earthlings also poses some thought-provoking questions: is Natsuki wrong for thinking she’s an alien? Is she wrong for all the things she did? And if so, 

Overall, I enjoyed reading Earthlings. It was weird read, but it was fun. Fun and insane. But fun! I read it in one day in 2023 and I couldn’t stop talking about Earthlings ever since.

Sashi

First and foremost: this is a very biased review because I love Sayaka Murata’s works. Earthlings in particular left me with the biggest impression because I just find the story to be ridiculously insane. The premise itself is already crazy but the book… the book is another level of mindfuckery for me. Natsuki is a very interesting main character. She’s imaginative and whimsical, always maintain a childlike personality even after she grew up. One thing that stood out the most though, is her stubbornness. Natsuki has this strong belief (that she’s an alien) she wouldn’t let go. It’s both scary and fascinating at the same time, how someone could be this sure of herself.

What I love the most about Earthlings is how crazy it is packaged. With Natsuki thinking she’s an alien and other characters who are just as out-of-this-world to say the least. It could be translated into several different messages and I don’t know which one is the truest. It talks about how society expects everyone to be the same and want the same thing, about how people who are deemed as different will always be treated like an outcast. Earthlings also poses some thought-provoking questions: is Natsuki wrong for thinking she’s an alien? Is she wrong for all the things she did? And if so, why do we think she’s wrong?

Overall, I enjoyed reading Earthlings. It was weird read, but it was fun. Fun and insane. But fun! I read it in one day in 2023 and I couldn’t stop talking about Earthlings ever since.

Kate

"Earthlings" by Sayaka Murata. This ain't a simple pick-me-up type of read. 
It's something that's gonna make you squirm a bit and might give you a couple of sleepless nights. 

But, that's the charm of it, right?

Cool stuff about it: First off, Murata has this talent for making her characters feel super real. Like you'd see them at your local grocery store or something. Natsuki, our main gal in this story, totally won my heart.

And the way Murata handles these crazy deep themes of societal pressures, being different (like really different), and feeling like you're totally alone in this world—it's like she's guiding us through a maze of emotions, always knowing where to make the next turn.

Her dark humor might hit you out of the blue, and trust me, it's refreshing in the midst of all that's going on in the story. It's a sweet blend of humor and pathos, in a style that's pure Murata.

Not so cool stuff: For real, "Earthlings" ain't for everyone. It walks a fine line and sometimes trespasses into some pretty dark and disturbing territories that'll make you question stuff. She spins the narrative into the world of magical realism, which ain’t everyone’s cup of tea.

Plus, some of the explicit scenes might be a tad hard to digest. So if you're someone who prefers to keep it light, let me warn you, this one covers some serious ground.

A quote I couldn't forget:
"We're all just animals."

This pretty much nails the vibe of the book for me. It's a reality check, reminding us that underneath all the color-coordinated Insta posts and hot cappuccinos, we're just straight-up animals, tied down by the rules we made up.

"Earthlings" is kinda intense, a bit gnarly, and sure to mess with your worldview. It's not everybody's type, but if you're up for a roller-coaster of emotions and you've got a taste for the unconventional—then this one's for you.

Alejandra 

An absolute page turner that had me hooked all the way until the end with it's bizarre storytelling led by a tragic protagonist. 

Mari Sivoney

jess larry

the last pages were so ??? i literally gasped, like are we dreaming or are we fr doing all that ???

idk how to rate this book, it was so uncomfortable & heartbreaking & weird and i guess that's the point so that's good, right ?

but i really like this take on non-conformity, societal pressures & the strong need for escapism qui en découle. l'essence du livre est assez similaire à convenience store woman actually, which makes sense 

they basically feel like they don't belong to society, et ne veulent pas se soumettre aux normes qu'on leur impose. so they decide to reject every "earthling" way of thinking, living and acting, thus totally embracing their "popobipianess" (completely forgot how to spell this thing)

3.5 stars, it was kinda entertaining but nothing out of this world. and i deeply wished mc could get revenge on her abusive family

Marian L

This has to be the MOST disturbing book I have ever read. I really wish I DNFed this from the begining. The blurb was very misleading and there were no mentions of trigger warnings at all. There was nothing good about this book. Is the author ok?

An uncomfortable and odd horror-story that I enjoyed and found surprisingly gross!

Anne Marit

Christian von Schack

Kolle

excellent, raw, uncensored portrait of things and characters. a bit too out there towards the end, to the point where it lost a bit of its seriousness.

Earthlings

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