murata

"As a child, Natsuki doesn't fit into her family. Her parents favor her sister, and her best friend is a plush toy hedgehog named Piyyut who has explained to her that he has come from the planet Popinpobopia on a special quest to help her save the Earth.Each summer, Natsuki counts down the days until her family drives into the mountains of Nagano to visit her grandparents in their wooden house in the forest. One summer, her cousin Yuu confides to...

"With Life Ceremony, the incomparable Sayaka Murata, whose Convenience Store Woman has now sold more than a million copies worldwide, returns with a brilliant and wonderfully unsettling collection, her most recent fiction to be published in Japan. In these twelve stories, Murata mixes an unusual cocktail of humor and horror and turns the norms and traditions of society on their head to better question them. In "A First-Rate Material," Nana and Naoki...

"Soramori has always held a torch for her old high school rival, Takebe. Now, thanks to one mean shoulderthrow, the two former (?) delinquents have started going out. But Soramori has a couple problems...For one thing, what's a“proper” date supposed to look like anyway? And what if she's not the only one with a thing for Takebe? Love's a battle in more ways than one!"--Page [4] of cover.

"The culture festival is underway, and class 1-B has rallied under Uka to run a maid café! Between that and all the festivities, there's so much for Uka to do... Will she manage to pull things off without a hitch?"--

Explains how such things as a goldfish bowl, a drop of water, or a magnifying glass act as lenses and describes the apprearance of objects viewed through them.