Every creative person should read this short book. No rules are laid down, but for those with an open mind there are hints galore and the occasional precept.

A fascinating glimpse of the peculiar writerly life

One of the most read authors around the world... You end this collection of beautiful essays vowing to never let life, or writing, get so complicated again.

A quirky, chatty collection of essays by the award-winning Japanese novelist... this charming collection opens up much of the Japanese master's thinking on a life of luck, hard work, and joy in his long vocation as a novelist.

Intriguing glimpses inside the singular mind of Murakami

Some of [Murakami's] best books are non-fiction: Underground, about the Tokyo sarin gas attack, and this year's Novelist as a Vocation, a book of essays about his life, writing method and the wellsprings of his extravagant imagination.

At any moment on our planet there are at most a few dozen novelists working with great power, for a broad audience, with the material of consciousness, which is what the novel is so uniquely good at handling, how it feels to be inside us, what it means, the devastations and beauties it brings. Murakami is one of them.

It's safe to say there is no one like Murakami

A true original

A master storyteller

Murakami is like a magician who explains what he's doing as he performs the trick and still makes you believe he has supernatural powers

One of the most influential novelists of his generation.

Murakami is one of the best writers around

'The world's most popular cult novelist'

Murakami's... latest offering, Novelist As A Vocation... offers a rare glimpse into his thoughts on writing... There's something magnetic that draws you into the narrative, so by the time the last page is turned, you're invested more than you realised

The Raptures is perfect and generous and beautifully crafted and everything I demand from a book. And Hannah, brave and brilliant Hannah -- I've made up a room for her in my heart forever. I'll be putting it in every hand this Christmas.

An instantly compelling and novel take on a fractured society, The Raptures is a captivating, clever book by a truly original writer

A compelling page-turner rendered in exquisite prose

Whip-smart and thoughtful with a dark vein of humour. Compulsively readable. I loved it

An important novel . . . Jo Harkin does a masterful job . . . this mind-bending debut will certainly make you think

A terrific read - I enjoyed it tremendously

Jo Harkin has created a speculative novel which digs into our instinctual curiosity and our need to know everything