8 must-read magical realism books like Earthlings by Sayaka Murata

If you liked the magical realism plot in Earthlings by Sayaka Murata , here is a list of 8 books like this:

Similar categories in Steven L. Peck's A Short Stay in Hell book and Sayaka Murata's Earthlings

• adult
• fantasy
• fiction
• horror

"Remember you are never really alone. Although it may feel like it for very long stretches of time."

-Steven L. Peck, A Short Stay in Hell

"[Y]ou are here to learn something. Don’t try to figure out what it is. This can be frustrating and unproductive."

-Steven L. Peck, A Short Stay in Hell

"Strange, how a moment of existence can cut so deeply into our being that while ages pass unnoticed, a brief love can structure and define the very topology of our consciousness ever after."

-Steven L. Peck, A Short Stay in Hell

"I could tell you of occasionally, every eon, meeting a person, with whom I might stay for a billion years. But what of it? After a billion years there is nothing left to say, and you wander apart, un…"

-Steven L. Peck, A Short Stay in Hell

Similar categories in Ottessa Moshfegh's Eileen book and Sayaka Murata's Earthlings

Similar categories in Han Kang's The Vegetarian book and Sayaka Murata's Earthlings

Similar categories in Ros Schwartz's I Who Have Never Known Men book and Sayaka Murata's Earthlings

• literary fiction
• adult
• fantasy
• fiction

"Survival is never more than putting off the moment of death."

-Ros Schwartz, I Who Have Never Known Men

"I thought it was unfair, and then I understood that, alone and terrified, anger was my only weapon against the horror"

-Ros Schwartz, I Who Have Never Known Men

"Look at them. They’re pretending, they behave as though they still have some control over their lives and make momentous decisions about which vegetable to cook first."

-Ros Schwartz, I Who Have Never Known Men

"Only now, I tell myself that what I'd felt for her, the trust that slowly built up, the constant preference for her company and the joy each time I was reunited with her after an expedition were prob…"

-Ros Schwartz, I Who Have Never Known Men

Similar categories in Agustina Bazterrica's Tender Is the Flesh book and Sayaka Murata's Earthlings

• literary fiction
• fiction
• horror
• contemporary
• adult
• audiobook

"Carcass."

-Agustina Bazterrica, Tender Is the Flesh

"She had the human look of a domesticated animal."

-Agustina Bazterrica, Tender Is the Flesh

"un matadero debería ignorarse, fundirse con el paisaje y nunca llamarse por lo que realmente es."

-Agustina Bazterrica, Tender Is the Flesh

"No entiendo por qué nos parece atractiva la sonrisa de una persona. Con la sonrisa uno está mostrando el esqueleto"."

-Agustina Bazterrica, Tender Is the Flesh

Similar categories in Mona Awad's Rouge book and Sayaka Murata's Earthlings

• literary fiction
• magical realism
• fiction
• horror
• contemporary
• adult
• fantasy
• audiobook

"If I had beauty, I decided then, I would never throw it away. I would never give it up."

-Mona Awad, Rouge

"I mean, we all have our dark days. Very dark days, sometimes. When our demons come out to play. No one lives entirely in the light, right?"

-Mona Awad, Rouge

"That I can’t protect you from my terrible places that I still go, can’t help but go because no one protected me, no one saved me, no one ever held out their hand and walked me away. But I’m trying to…"

-Mona Awad, Rouge

Similar categories in Mieko Kawakami's All the Lovers in the Night book and Sayaka Murata's Earthlings

• literary fiction
• japanese literature
• fiction
• contemporary
• adult
• japan
• audiobook

"It only took me a couple of hours to realise that she was a woman of talents beyond anything I could imagine - even though I was a stranger to such talents myself."

-Mieko Kawakami, All the Lovers in the Night

"The light at night is special because the overwhelming light of day has left us, and the remaining half draws on everything it has to keep the world around us bright."

-Mieko Kawakami, All the Lovers in the Night

"When I felt sleepy I slept, and when I opened my eyes I got up, letting hunger dictate when to head to the fridge or kitchen cabinet to eat some of the things that I'd stocked up on. When supplies ra…"

-Mieko Kawakami, All the Lovers in the Night

"When I felt sleepy I slept, and when I opened my eyes I got up, letting hunger dictate when to head to the fridge or kitchen cabinet to eat some of the things that I'd stocked up on. When supplies ra…"

-Mieko Kawakami, All the Lovers in the Night

Similar categories in Julia Armfield's Our Wives Under the Sea book and Sayaka Murata's Earthlings

• literary fiction
• fiction
• horror
• contemporary
• adult
• audiobook

"El océano profundo es una casa embrujada: un lugar donde se mueven en la oscuridad cosas que no deberían existir."

-Julia Armfield, Our Wives Under the Sea

"She refused almost every aspect of my help, the way women will when they've been bred to accept little more than the baset civility."

-Julia Armfield, Our Wives Under the Sea

"I don't know why I expected you to read my mind,' I say, when I call back to leave her a message, 'I was just doing what I always do, assuming the world revolves around me."

-Julia Armfield, Our Wives Under the Sea

"The space around us is a claw half grasped, holding tight without quite crushing, and I wish, in the idle way I always wish these days, that I felt more confident in my ability to breathe."

-Julia Armfield, Our Wives Under the Sea

Similar categories in Gerardo Sámano Córdova's Monstrilio book and Sayaka Murata's Earthlings

• literary fiction
• magical realism
• fiction
• horror
• contemporary
• adult
• fantasy
• audiobook

"The world was scary. Worse, I was scary in it."

-Gerardo Sámano Córdova, Monstrilio

"I wanted him to snap, to finally and absolutely lose it. To break. He was withering. To wither is not the same as to break; to break is to have pieces to put back together, and to wither is to dry up…"

-Gerardo Sámano Córdova, Monstrilio

Similar categories in Mona Awad's Bunny book and Sayaka Murata's Earthlings

• literary fiction
• magical realism
• fiction
• horror
• contemporary
• adult
• fantasy
• audiobook

"The pink pony inside me weeps softly."

-Mona Awad, Bunny

"Oh, Bunny, I love you. I love you, Bunny."

-Mona Awad, Bunny

"We think of it as art meets life, Bunny. We’re putting art into the world."

-Mona Awad, Bunny

"Because life is shorter than we are, she says, so why beat around the bush?"

-Mona Awad, Bunny

Similar categories in Ottessa Moshfegh's Lapvona book and Sayaka Murata's Earthlings

• literary fiction
• magical realism
• fiction
• horror
• contemporary
• adult
• fantasy
• audiobook

"But such was death - it had nothing to say."

-Ottessa Moshfegh, Lapvona

"Blood was the wine of the spirit, was it not?"

-Ottessa Moshfegh, Lapvona

"What scared her were other people and their immovable selfishness"

-Ottessa Moshfegh, Lapvona

"But Jude's piety was a kind of violent urge and not the love and peace it ought to be"

-Ottessa Moshfegh, Lapvona

Similar categories in Jenny Hval's Paradise Rot book and Sayaka Murata's Earthlings

• literary fiction
• magical realism
• fiction
• horror
• contemporary
• fantasy
• audiobook

"I took a bite of a Bloody Ploughman. Even the flesh was red. 'Bloody,' Carral said. 'Nice colour,' I answered. 'It looks sinful. I bet that was the apple Eve ate, you know, in the Bible, the forbidde…"

-Jenny Hval, Paradise Rot

"I'll tell you the fairy tale of the apple. Eve ate the apple, and then Adam came and did so too. Afterwards the apple was forgotten, and it was assumed that it rolled away in the grass while Adam and…"

-Jenny Hval, Paradise Rot

Similar categories in Ainslie Hogarth's Motherthing book and Sayaka Murata's Earthlings

• fiction
• horror
• contemporary
• adult
• audiobook

"Too much human touching will change a thing."

-Ainslie Hogarth, Motherthing

"A Good Woman butchers her meat properly, without cruelty."

-Ainslie Hogarth, Motherthing

"I can save you. With Secrets of a Famous Chef I can save you."

-Ainslie Hogarth, Motherthing

"I bubble again with blinding-hot, spine-severing cumshitkill."

-Ainslie Hogarth, Motherthing

Similar categories in Sayaka Murata's Earthlings book and Sayaka Murata's Earthlings

• literary fiction
• magical realism
• japanese literature
• fiction
• contemporary
• horror
• adult
• fantasy
• japan
• audiobook

"Sobreviver, haja o que houver."

-Sayaka Murata, Earthlings

"O senso comum é uma doença contagiosa e é difícil manter a infecção sozinho."

-Sayaka Murata, Earthlings

"I thought that when I grew up society would brainwash me, but it didn't work."

-Sayaka Murata, Earthlings

"Até quando eu teria de sobreviver? Será que algum dia poderia apenas viver e não sobreviver?"

-Sayaka Murata, Earthlings

Similar categories in Bora Chung's Cursed Bunny book and Sayaka Murata's Earthlings

• magical realism
• fiction
• horror
• contemporary
• adult
• fantasy

"Her husband had pursued an “alternative lifestyle"

-Bora Chung, Cursed Bunny

"One can break the curse, but it is impossible to cure their blindness from greed. They were always ready to wage another war"

-Bora Chung, Cursed Bunny

"But there I remained, standing in the bathroom, waiting for someone to miraculously find me, to release me from my ties to this life."

-Bora Chung, Cursed Bunny

"Once you experience a terrible trauma and understand the world from an extreme perspective, it is difficult to overcome this perspective. Because your very survival depends on it."

-Bora Chung, Cursed Bunny

Similar categories in Jade Song's Chlorine book and Sayaka Murata's Earthlings

• literary fiction
• fiction
• horror
• contemporary
• adult
• fantasy
• audiobook

"Nearly every human memory is corrupted by the fact that it is a memory of being human"

-Jade Song, Chlorine

"Would a mermaid who stays at home, much-loved, with two beautiful parents and loving sisters who share everything, be worth memorializing? No."

-Jade Song, Chlorine

"Humans break so easily. They break their bones, their bodies, their hearts. I, too, as a girl, once broke. My head. And when this happened, I, like many other humans, did not allow myself the time an…"

-Jade Song, Chlorine

Similar categories in Mieko Kawakami's Breasts and Eggs book and Sayaka Murata's Earthlings

• literary fiction
• japanese literature
• japan
• fiction
• contemporary
• audiobook

"Then there are the real bastards, like my ex,"

-Mieko Kawakami, Breasts and Eggs

"Mi sentivo come un essere privato della carne e della pelle e ridotto a sole ossa. Un carapace enorme completamente cavo."

-Mieko Kawakami, Breasts and Eggs

"We could worry about tomorrow when it came. What mattered most right now is how we would spend the remainder of today, even if it was half over."

-Mieko Kawakami, Breasts and Eggs

"I could see people all around me, but I almost felt like nobody could see me. I heard a train go by, rumbling down the tracks, drawing a thick line between the world and my experience. I was getting …"

-Mieko Kawakami, Breasts and Eggs

Similar categories in Mieko Kawakami's Heaven book and Sayaka Murata's Earthlings

• literary fiction
• japanese literature
• japan
• fiction
• contemporary
• audiobook

"Karena kau selalu dilukai, kau sungguh-sungguh memahami seperti apakah orang terluka."

-Mieko Kawakami, Heaven

"The more I looked at it, the less it seemed like something for a house. More like a tiny gravestone."

-Mieko Kawakami, Heaven

"You think about how other people feel. You're so kind. It makes sense. Because we're always in pain, we know exactly what it means to hurt somebody else."

-Mieko Kawakami, Heaven

"People are always dying. It's a perfect truth. No matter how we live our lives, we all die, sooner or later. In which case, living is really just waiting to die."

-Mieko Kawakami, Heaven

Similar categories in Emi Yagi's Diary of a Void book and Sayaka Murata's Earthlings

• literary fiction
• japanese literature
• japan
• fiction
• contemporary
• audiobook

"Having a baby isn't easy. Damned if you do, damned if you don't. It's been two thousand years, and it's the same old story, right?"

-Emi Yagi, Diary of a Void

"I'm always so alone. I guess I should be used to it by now. That's the way it is from the moment we come into this world, but I'm still not used to it - how alone we all are."

-Emi Yagi, Diary of a Void

"Maybe that's making a family is all about: creating an environment in which people make space for one another - maybe without even trying, just naturally, to make sure that nobody's forgotten."

-Emi Yagi, Diary of a Void

"Until they arrived, while everyone else was transitioning to winter, putting on coats and sweaters, I was going to stick with my summer dress and my usual work blazer. Dressed in the dazzling flowers…"

-Emi Yagi, Diary of a Void

Similar categories in Eliza Clark's Boy Parts book and Sayaka Murata's Earthlings

• literary fiction
• fiction
• horror
• contemporary
• adult
• audiobook

"Was it my idea to have him hurt me, or did he just let me think it was?"

-Eliza Clark, Boy Parts

"My mam always used to tell me that you catch more flies with honey than with vinegar. And Eddie from Tesco is a fly, but he's got a taste for vinegar. It's like vinegar is all he's ever had from peop…"

-Eliza Clark, Boy Parts

"You want to think you're not like other women, but you are, you know. You're still... that's still how the rest of the world, how men are going to see you. Like, I know you hate labels, but you like.…"

-Eliza Clark, Boy Parts

"Do you like it rough? I think so. I think I must. Men are rough, aren't they? Have I always had a taste for rough stuff, or did I acquire that? In the back of Lesley's car, on the floor of a friend's…"

-Eliza Clark, Boy Parts

Similar categories in Rachel Yoder's Nightbitch book and Sayaka Murata's Earthlings

• literary fiction
• magical realism
• fiction
• horror
• contemporary
• adult
• fantasy
• audiobook

"In such moments, she could almost touch her loneliness, as if it were her second child."

-Rachel Yoder, Nightbitch

"Her secrets were the only things these days that were purely hers, things apart from mother and wife and middle-aged woman."

-Rachel Yoder, Nightbitch

"Yes, certainly, her emerging rage was in part a by-product of physiological processes, but how could you not be pissed after having a baby?"

-Rachel Yoder, Nightbitch

"It had been so long since she had remembered all this, so long since she'd even thought of it, for there had been a great forgetting when she left home--a purposeful forgetting, because to forget her…"

-Rachel Yoder, Nightbitch