Haruki Murakami Manga Stories 2: The Second Bakery Attack; Samsa in Love; Thailand

Haruki Murakami's novels, essays and short stories have sold millions of copies worldwide and been translated into scores of languages. Now for the first time, in this three-volume series, Murakami's best-loved stories are available in manga form in English.

With their trademark mix of realism and fantasy, centering around Murakami's signature themes of loss, remorse and confusion, the three stories in this volume are:

• The Second Bakery Attack: A newlywed couple lie in bed, hungry. The man tells his wife that ten years earlier, he and his friend tried to rob a bakery. The baker told them that if they listened to Wagner's Tannhauser and The Flying Dutchman with him, they could take what they wanted. They did so and left with enough bread to feed them for two days. On hearing this story, the woman suggests they try the same thing. They drive around Tokyo looking for a bakery, but the only place open is a McDonald's. With a shotgun they demand 30 Big Macs. They find an empty parking lot where they eat until their fill. The man feels calm and satisfied after this experience." [...] exemplifies Murakami's sense of the fragility of the ordinary world." --Kirkus Reviews


• Samsa in Love is an extension of the tale of Gregor Samsa in Kafka's Metamorphosis. The main character wakes up finding himself transformed into someone named Samsa, and then falls in love with a hunchback woman who comes to fix the lock on his door. "Samsa in Love is part of a lineage, going back to the original publication of "The Metamorphosis" in 1915 and extending up to (and beyond?) the present day." --Los Angeles Times


• Thailand: A middle-aged woman takes a break from her job as a doctor to go on holiday in Thailand. She learns from a spirit doctor that her sterile life and inability to forgive have created a rock in her gut, which will be all that remains of her after she is dead. "His characters are so persuasive, and the storytelling so spacious.... Murakami's crisp, accomplished stories...have great immediacy." --The Seattle Times