Peak Murata brilliance and absolute weirdness! This book is full of strange short stories. As I finished each story, I thought to myself 'this is the weirdest story yet', after every single story. I adore Murata's weird and wonderful mind. 4 stars and highly recommended.

**Life Ceremony** by **Sayaka Murata** is a darkly fascinating and unsettling exploration of societal norms, human relationships, and the strange rituals that govern life and death. Known for her ability to tap into the surreal and the macabre, Murata, author of the internationally acclaimed *Convenience Store Woman*, once again delivers a novel that feels both alien and familiar, pushing boundaries of cultural expectations with her sharp, thought-provoking narrative. *Life Ceremony* is a series of interconnected short stories that explore the intersection of life, death, and the rituals surrounding them, all wrapped in Murata's signature blend of the bizarre and the everyday.

### Plot Overview:
*Life Ceremony* is composed of seven distinct yet thematically linked stories. In each of these stories, Murata presents a world where the seemingly ordinary is twisted into something strange, where characters live on the margins of conventional society and engage in rituals that subvert traditional norms. In the opening title story, the narrator attends a life ceremony, a ritual where people consume the bodies of the deceased in a sort of taboo cannibalistic act to celebrate their life. This shocking practice, presented as just another aspect of everyday life in this fictional world, sets the tone for the stories that follow—ones that explore the ways humans navigate uncomfortable social expectations, the choices that we make in the face of conformity, and the complexities of what it means to live and die.

Throughout the book, Murata introduces characters who are outsiders in one way or another. These characters engage in often bizarre, unorthodox behavior as they try to reconcile their inner worlds with societal expectations. The stories are not just about the act of death, but about how humans interact with the inevitability of their existence, how they cope with alienation, and how their relationships to those around them shape their sense of identity.

While each story can stand on its own, the recurring themes of consumption (both literal and metaphorical), rituals, and the rejection of societal norms weave through the book, creating an overarching narrative about what it means to live authentically in a world full of strange conventions.

### Character Development:
Murata's characters are often portrayed as people who do not quite fit into the norms of society. In *Life Ceremony*, her protagonists are similarly outsiders—individuals who question, reject, or participate in unconventional behaviors in order to make sense of the world around them. The characters in this collection often seem disconnected or numb to the world, trying to navigate societal rules that feel foreign, uncomfortable, or absurd.

For example, the protagonist of the title story, who participates in the life ceremony, feels oddly detached, going through the motions of a ritual that should be fraught with emotion but instead comes across as strangely clinical. This disconnect from human emotion and intimacy is something that runs through all of Murata's characters. They often grapple with a desire for connection, but find themselves distanced by social conventions or their own inability to process emotion in the traditional ways.

Murata is a master at capturing this sense of alienation, showing how people try to find meaning in their lives through unusual, often unsettling practices. Her characters are never fully at peace with themselves or the world they inhabit, and this inner conflict is often what makes their actions so fascinating to read about. They feel like people on the edge—disconnected from mainstream society but still searching for some sort of understanding or connection, even if that connection takes a strange form.

### Writing Style:
Murata’s writing is as unsettling as it is precise. She has a knack for turning the mundane into the strange, and she excels at describing scenes that feel simultaneously surreal and ordinary. There’s an eerie, off-kilter quality to her prose that lingers long after the story is finished. In *Life Ceremony*, she creates a disorienting world where nothing feels fully grounded, yet everything is eerily plausible.

Her descriptions are minimalistic, yet there’s a sharpness to her observations. Whether she’s describing a life ceremony, a strange ritual, or the quiet despair of her characters, Murata’s writing feels both distant and intimate. There’s a clinical, almost anthropological tone to the way she depicts human behavior, but it is never cold—there’s always an underlying emotional current that keeps the reader hooked. In this way, she’s able to draw readers into worlds that are unsettling, where the boundaries between the normal and the grotesque blur.

The pacing of the stories is deliberate. Murata doesn’t rush through her narratives; instead, she allows moments to unfold with a sense of quiet tension. This pacing, combined with her use of absurdity and dark humor, creates a deeply immersive reading experience.

### Themes:
1. **Rituals and Social Norms**: A central theme in *Life Ceremony* is the role of rituals and social conventions in shaping human behavior. Murata challenges the reader to question the rituals we take for granted, whether it's in how we mourn death, interact with others, or even consume food. The title story itself centers around a bizarre ritual that turns the very notion of death and life into a grotesque celebration. Through these rituals, Murata explores how society’s rules and customs shape our actions and perceptions, and how they can sometimes feel more like constraints than expressions of genuine emotion.

2. **Alienation and Outsiders**: Another major theme in the book is the alienation of individuals who don't conform to societal expectations. Murata’s characters are often depicted as feeling disconnected from the world around them, grappling with a sense of dislocation. Whether it's dealing with an intimate relationship or performing a strange societal duty, they often seem unable to fully connect with others or with their surroundings. This alienation is a lens through which Murata explores the tension between individual desires and societal pressures.

3. **Life and Death**: Murata delves into the complex relationship between life and death in a way that feels both absurd and deeply profound. The life ceremony, for instance, is a grotesque and strange way to commemorate the dead, flipping traditional views on mortality on their head. In each of her stories, death is not treated with reverence or even sadness, but as something that must be processed in an almost clinical manner. Life and death are intertwined, and Murata’s characters grapple with the meaning of both in a society that often seems to gloss over or sanitize these concepts.

4. **Consumption and Identity**: In a number of the stories, the theme of consumption—both literal and metaphorical—emerges as a key motif. Murata explores how people consume each other, their surroundings, and their own emotions in ways that reflect their desires, fears, and identities. Consumption here is not just physical but psychological and emotional, symbolizing the ways in which people are shaped by the act of taking in and absorbing their environment and the people around them.

5. **Absurdity and Surrealism**: Murata’s trademark style of mixing the mundane with the bizarre continues in *Life Ceremony*. The strange rituals and behaviors that her characters engage in—whether it's attending a cannibalistic ceremony or engaging in bizarre sexual practices—convey a sense of absurdity, which forces readers to reconsider the boundaries between normal and abnormal, real and imagined. This surreal quality not only challenges societal norms but also emphasizes the arbitrary nature of human behavior.

### Emotional Impact:
*Life Ceremony* is not a light read. It is often discomforting and strange, yet the emotional impact is undeniable. Murata’s exploration of life, death, and societal expectations forces readers to confront the absurdity of human rituals and the complexities of human desire. While the stories themselves can be unsettling or bizarre, there’s an underlying melancholy that runs through the book. Murata’s characters are searching for something—connection, purpose, understanding—and their inability to find it speaks to the universal human experience of grappling with isolation and the weight of societal pressures.

The emotional journey in *Life Ceremony* is not one of healing or resolution, but rather an exploration of the strange ways people try to make sense of their existence. Murata’s work forces readers to confront uncomfortable questions about the nature of society, identity, and death in a way that is both thought-provoking and deeply unsettling.

### Final Thoughts:
*Life Ceremony* is a complex, thought-provoking collection of stories that challenges readers to question the rituals, norms, and conventions that shape our lives. Sayaka Murata’s ability to blend the surreal with the everyday creates a world that feels both familiar and disturbingly alien. Her sharp observations on society, alienation, and human behavior are sure to resonate with readers who appreciate dark, intellectual fiction that pushes boundaries.

For those familiar with Murata’s previous work, such as *Convenience Store Woman*, *Life Ceremony* will feel both familiar and new. While her earlier work also explored themes of alienation and societal norms, *Life Ceremony* takes those themes to darker, more absurd extremes, delving deeper into the grotesque and the macabre. It’s a fascinating, unsettling read that will stay with readers long after they finish it.

Fans of authors like **Yoko Ogawa** (*The Memory Police*) and **Haruki Murakami** will find much to enjoy in *Life Ceremony*, with its exploration of the human condition through surreal, disquieting lenses. Ultimately, it’s a book about the way we live, the way we die, and the strange rituals that bind us all together.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publishers for this ARC.

Sayaka Murata shocks the world again with this amazingly gripping book of Horror stories.

Murata takes all the taboo topics in our society and flips them. Shockingly beautiful

WEIRD and wild. If you loved Earthlings, except more of the same but with the dial turned up another few notches.

I absolutely adored this short story collection but I expect it's one that readers will either LOVE or HATE.

I was expecting something out of the ordinary from this book having already read Earthlings by Sayaka Murata... but that's an understatement. I just didn't enjoy this book at all.

I liked the concept of all of these short stories focused on taboo themes and just odd things.
One story is told from the perspective of a sentient curtain; another story talks about a society where people don't sleep and live mostly at night; in another cannibalism was normalized as a way to honor people's lives after death, and there was yet another in which it was normal to transform human bodies after death into furniture, clothing/etc as a way of not wasting 'natural resources'. There are a few more mundane ones, like teenagers learning and talking about sexuality, asexual marriages, and same-sex families.

The main thing that bothered me was the writing and the way these stories were organized: detailed descriptions that were revolting, or confusing, stories that lasted a page, two consequent stories in which the main characters had the same names, but were apparently different and unrelated. One story even had a character that had a very similar story to the main character from Earthlings...

Overall, this just wasn't for me. I'm still curious about Murata's Convenience Store Woman, and this author's future works as I really quite liked Earthlings.

Hmmmm... what the heck did I just read?!
Life Ceremony is a collection of short stories which range from fairly weird to extremely bizarre!
Tw - this does contain stories about cannibalism.
Personally I love weird and wacky stories!

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"Life Ceremony" by Sayaka Murata is a collection of short fiction that defies conventions and takes readers on a surreal and thought-provoking journey. Murata's stories delve into the strange and the bizarre, challenging societal norms and exploring the human psyche in ways that are both unsettling and captivating. From unconventional relationships and body horror to feminist revenge tales and the exploration of identity, these stories push the boundaries of contemporary fiction. Murata's unique narrative style and ability to tackle taboo subjects make "Life Ceremony" a compelling and unforgettable read that will leave readers pondering the intricacies of human existence and society's expectations.

If you want a blend of Convenience Store Woman and Earthlings then this is the book for you. Some stories are social commentary on the way we live our lives, and others are that plus gross gory thought experiments about the potential futures.

I was so excited to receive this ARC as I read Convenience Store Woman at the start of the year and absolutely loved it. I was apprehensive as I am not often the biggest fan of short story collections but this was so different from anything else I have read and so utterly and wonderfully bizarre. Have recommended this to so many people!

Life Ceremony is the first collection of short stories by Sayaka Murata to be translated into English.

Having read both Convenience Store Woman and Earthlings by this author I knew I was in for a bit of a wild ride. Previous reviews I spotted for the book have once again described her writing as “not for everyone” and I would repeat that. The stories in this collection are a bit “off the wall”, and I don’t think I have ever whispered “WTF” to myself as much as I did while reading this collection.

In the title story Life Ceremony we are introduced to a future society where upon death the deceased is not buried or cremated, but eaten at a lavish ceremony which ends with people choosing a partner to try and procreate with. In another story A First Rate Material an engaged couple fight over the fact that they cannot agree about whether to use furniture and clothes made from human remains – which is known to be the height of fashion. The would-be brides friends often remark about how strange it is that her boyfriend refuses to buy here jewelry set in human bone.

We also have stories about wild foraging, loving bedroom soft furnishings and purposely marrying someone who you have no emotional connection with, just to have an easy life. And more!

What reality these stories are set in is never very clear. In Life Ceremony the protagonist talks about how when she was a child she joked about eating someone and everyone was shocked and thought she had something wrong with her, yet in “today’s society” if you DON’T eat people (as she refuses to) there is something wrong, but there is little to no reference to anything from “now”.

So, yes, this is probably the weirdest collection of short stories I have ever read. At times it was difficult to read it while eating – see cannibalism – but I found almost every story fascinating. A brilliant collection.

*My thanks to the publishers and NetGalley for providing a copy of this book for review. Apologies that it took me far too long to get to it.

I have enjoyed Sayaka Murata in the past and needed to read these short stories. They did not disappoint. Full of the quirky worlds that seem so real and push you to consider many different aspects of how humans engage with the people around them.

Thank you NetGalley and Granta Books for the eArc.

Modern Japan’s most punk and exciting author returns, this time with a short story collection titled Life Ceremony.

“In these twelve stories, Murata mixes an unusual cocktail of humor and horror to portray both the loners and outcasts as well as turning the norms and traditions of society on their head to better question them.

Whether the stories take place in modern-day Japan, the future, or an alternate reality is left to the reader’s interpretation, as the characters often seem strange in their normality in a frighteningly abnormal world.

In “A First-Rate Material,” Nana and Naoki are happily engaged, but Naoki can’t stand the conventional use of deceased people’s bodies for clothing, accessories, and furniture, and a disagreement around this threatens to derail their perfect wedding day.

“Lovers on the Breeze” is told from the perspective of a curtain in a child’s bedroom that jealously watches the young girl Naoko as she has her first kiss with a boy from her class and does its best to stop her.

“Eating the City” explores the strange norms around food and foraging, while “Hatchling” closes the collection with an extraordinary depiction of the fractured personality of someone who tries too hard to fit in.” – Grove Atlantic

A collection of short stories that I have enjoyed while being completely baffled about the culture.

Thank you Netgalley and the publishers for the arc in exchange for my honest review

Let me preface this by saying that I love weird books and short stories, so this was always going to be right up my street. This was gross but in a good way, and I really enjoyed how Murata challenged societal norms throughout each story. It's hard for me to select a favourite story as each one had something so wonderfully bizarre for me to enjoy.
I can appreciate why some might not enjoy Murata's writing style and the content of her stories, but I really enjoyed Life Ceremony. Excited to read more from her now!

Many thanks to the author, publisher, and Netgalley for sending me a copy of this book in return for an honest review.

Sayaka Murata does it again with her shocking but very gripping book, a collection of Horror stories.

Murata takes all the taboo topics in our society and world and flips them that they are normal in their retrospective stories. In one, when people die, their bodies are used as furniture and more. Another, people get eaten when they die.

The stories are very off-putting but there is really something magnificent how Murata can take these uncomfortable topics and make it something you can't help but keep read and wonder what if life was different and this was the norm?

If you liked Earthlings, you'd enjoy this one but it's is very different to the authors Convenience Store Woman so be prepared!

Definitely a lot more out there than Convenience Store Woman but another excellent book from Murata.

After the absolute chaos that was Earthlings, I knew i had to request this.
Many Thanks to NetGalley and Granta for an eARC in exchange for an honest review.

Review:
Plot- The book is a collection of short stories, each one more wild than the previous and i absolutely loved every second of this. Most of the stories follow strange feelings of females or ideals pushed upon them as a society and it's really interesting to see these taken to the extreme in such a futuristic forward and honest way, which is probably why i enjoy the craziness of these. Definitely kept guessing during some of the stories.

World building-each indvidual short story is well built and written, with all being extremely fast paced.

Characters- each stories character(s) were really well thought out and written, with great development and just so well done.

Final Thoughts,
Absolutely chaotic short stories i absolutely loved and would definitely recommend if you want something different, with punchy short stories you can dip in and out of.

I'm not always a fan of short stories but with Sayaka Murata being an all time favourite author I knew that I had to give this a go, and wow did this blow my exceptions away. Seven pages in and I felt a strong feeling of disgust and yet was compelled onto the next story. This book explores morality and what the behaviours that society finds acceptable or palatable and just how easily these thing ca change. With a strong focus on death and how we treat the dead and how this reflects how we treat and view the living and the value of life this book of sort stories will have you contemplating you own morality and whether it's a good thing to just accept what society tells us or risk looking like an outcast. I recommend this book to anyone that enjoyed Tender is the flesh and want's something with a similar theme.

Sayaka Murata never misses with her horrifying, unhinged reads. I've enjoyed her transition from Convenience Store Women to darker, more disgusting topics! I would buy this for all the lovers of horror in my life.