Haruki Murakami Reading Order

21 books (1991–2026)

The Anthologies series is an ongoing collection of 18 anthologies spanning from 1991 to 2026, encompassing fantasy, literary fiction, and non-fiction works. These anthologies should be read in publication order, beginning with Fourth Annual Collection and continuing through the most recent entries. The series includes a diverse range of curated short stories and essays, such as Monkey Brain Sushi, The Vintage Book of Amnesia, and Alone in the Kitchen with an Eggplant, offering varied perspectives across genres and themes.

Start with Fourth Annual Collection, the first of 18 books in the Anthologies series.

#	Title
1	Fourth Annual Collection 1991Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
2	Monkey Brain Sushi: New Tastes in Japanese Fiction 1991Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
3	The Year's Best Fantasy and Horror Fourth Annual Collection 1991Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
4	40 Short Stories: A Portable Anthology 2000Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
5	The Campfire Collection: Spine-tingling Tales to Tell in the Dark 2000Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
6	The Vintage Book of Amnesia 2000Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
7	Year's Best Fantasy and Horror: Sixteenth Annual Collection 2003Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
8	Birthday Stories 2004Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
9	The Believer Book of Writers Talking to Writers 2005Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
10	Alone in the Kitchen with an Eggplant: Confessions of Cooking for One and Dining Alone 2007Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
11	Read Real Japanese Essays 2008Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
12	Great Modern Stories 2009Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
13	Short Stories: The Thoroughly Modern Collection 2009Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
14	Stories to Get You Through the Night 2010Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
15	AQA GCSE Anthology Sunlight on the Grass 2012Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
16	Ten Selected Love Stories 2013Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
17	Freeman's: Arrival 2015Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
18	Knakketiknakk 2018Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
19	Writers: Their Lives and Works 2018Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
20	MONKEY New Writing From Japan Volume 2: TRAVEL 2021Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
21	The Penguin Book of the International Short Story 2026Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible

3 books (2023–2025)

This ongoing graphic novel series adapts stories by Haruki Murakami across three volumes published between 2023 and 2025. Each installment collects multiple manga adaptations of Murakami's short fiction, with the first volume featuring Super-Frog Saves Tokyo, The Seventh Man, Birthday Girl, and Where I'm Likely to Find It, followed by The Second Bakery Attack, Samsa in Love, and Thailand in the second volume, and Scheherezade and Sleep in the third. Read the books in publication order to experience these literary works in their intended graphic format presentation.

Start with Haruki Murakami Manga Stories 1: Super-Frog Saves Tokyo, The Seventh Man, Birthday Girl, Where I'm Likely to Find It and read in order.

#	Title
1	Haruki Murakami Manga Stories 1: Super-Frog Saves Tokyo, The Seventh Man, Birthday Girl, Where I'm Likely to Find It 2023Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
2	Haruki Murakami Manga Stories 2: The Second Bakery Attack, Samsa in Love, Thailand 2024Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
3	Haruki Murakami Manga Stories 3: Scheherezade, Sleep 2025Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible

1 book (2017–2017)

10 books (2000–2020)

This nine-book non-fiction series by Haruki Murakami spans from 2000 to 2020 and should be read in publication order. The collection includes essay collections, diaries, and conversational works that offer insight into Murakami's creative process, personal interests, and reflections on Japanese culture and society. Several volumes feature collaborations with translators Philip Gabriel and Ted Goossen. The series is complete.

Start with Underground: The Tokyo Gas Attack and the Japanese Psyche, the first of 9 books in the Non-Fiction series.

#	Title
1	Underground: The Tokyo Gas Attack and the Japanese Psyche 2000Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
2	Murakami Diary 2009 2008Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
3	What I Talk About When I Talk About Running 2008Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
4	Novelist as a Vocation(With: Philip Gabriel,Ted Goossen) 2015Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
5	村上さんのところ 2015Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
6	Absolutely on Music 2016Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
7	Haruki Murakami Goes to Meet Hayao Kawai 2016Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
8	Abandoning a Cat 2019Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
9	Murakami 2020 Diary 2019Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
10	Murakami T: The T-Shirts I Love(With: Philip Gabriel) 2020Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible

17 books (1993–2012)

Selected Shorts is a complete 17-book anthology series published between 1993 and 2012, featuring curated short stories across diverse themes and genres. The books should be read in publication order, beginning with For Better and for Worse and progressing through thematic collections such as Falling in Love, Family Matters, Food Fictions, Travel Tales, and Whodunit?. Each volume brings together literary fiction and fantasy stories organized around specific topics, making them suitable for both sequential reading and standalone enjoyment. The series concluded in 2012 with American Classics and two additional final volumes.

Start with For Better and for Worse, the first of 17 books in the Selected Shorts series.

#	Title
1	For Better and for Worse 1993Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
2	Even More Laughs 1998Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
3	Timeless Classics 2006Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
4	Edith Wharton 2007Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
5	Falling in Love 2007Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
6	Family Matters 2007Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
7	Food Fictions 2007Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
8	Pets! 2007Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
9	Tales of Betrayal 2007Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
10	Travel Tales 2007Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
11	Are We There Yet? 2008Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
12	A Touch of Magic 2009Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
13	The William Hurt Collection 2009Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
14	Whodunit? 2009Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
15	American Classics 2010Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
16	New American Stories 2011Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
17	Poe! 2012Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible

10 books (1981–2025)

Haruki Murakami's Short Stories and Novellas series spans from 1981 to 2025 and comprises ten collected works that showcase the author's distinctive blend of fantasy and literary fiction across shorter formats. The series remains ongoing and should be read in publication order, beginning with On Seeing the 100% Perfect Girl on One Beautiful April Morning and progressing through diverse pieces including The Vampire Cabbie, Sleep, Tony Takitani, The Strange Library, Drive My Car, and Super-Frog Saves Tokyo. These standalone stories and novellas demonstrate Murakami's range as a writer working outside his longer narrative forms.

Start with On Seeing the 100% Perfect Girl on One Beautiful April Morning, the first of 10 books in the Short Stories/Novellas series.

#	Title
1	On Seeing the 100% Perfect Girl on One Beautiful April Morning 1981Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
2	The Vampire Cabbie 1983Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
3	Desire 1984Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
4	Kangaroo Weather 1986Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
5	Sleep 1987Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
6	Tony Takitani 2006Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
7	The Strange Library 2012Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
8	Drive My Car(With: Ted Goossen) 2013Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
9	Birthday Girl 2019Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
10	Super-Frog Saves Tokyo 2025Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible

6 books (1993–2020)

Haruki Murakami's Short Story Collections series comprises six volumes of literary fiction published between 1993 and 2020. The series is complete and should be read in publication order, beginning with The Elephant Vanishes. These collections showcase Murakami's distinctive blend of fantasy and realism across stories spanning nearly three decades of his career.

Start with The Elephant Vanishes, the first of 6 books in the Short Story Collections series.

#	Title
1	The Elephant Vanishes 1993Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
2	After the Quake 2002Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
3	Vintage Murakami 2004Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
4	Blind Willow, Sleeping Woman 2006Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
5	Men Without Women 2017Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
6	First Person Singular: Stories(With: Philip Gabriel) 2020Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible

10 books (1985–2024)

Haruki Murakami's standalone novels span from 1985 to 2024, comprising ten independent works that can be read in any order but are often approached chronologically by publication date. The series showcases Murakami's distinctive blend of literary fiction, fantasy elements, and philosophical themes across diverse narratives featuring surreal landscapes and introspective protagonists. Beginning with Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World and continuing through recent works like The City and Its Uncertain Walls, these novels represent an ongoing exploration of consciousness, isolation, and the mysterious forces shaping human experience. Reading in publication order allows readers to trace the evolution of Murakami's distinctive narrative voice and thematic concerns over nearly four decades.

Start with Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World, the first of 10 books in the Standalone Novels series.

#	Title
1	Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World 1985Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
2	Norwegian Wood 1987Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
3	The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle 1997Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
4	South of the Border, West of the Sun 1999Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
5	Sputnik Sweetheart 2001Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
6	Kafka on the Shore 2005Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
7	After Dark 2007Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
8	1Q84 2011Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
9	Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and His Years of Pilgrimage 2014Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
10	The City and Its Uncertain Walls 2024Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible

4 books (1979–1988)

The Rat is a four-book literary fantasy series by Haruki Murakami, published between 1979 and 1988 and now complete. The series follows a interconnected narrative across four novels: Hear the Wind Sing, Pinball, 1973, A Wild Sheep Chase, and Dance, Dance, Dance. Readers should begin with Hear the Wind Sing and proceed in publication order to experience the full arc of this surreal, meditative series that blends realism with dreamlike imagery.

Start with Hear the Wind Sing, the first of 4 books in the The Rat series.

#	Title
1	Hear the Wind Sing 1979Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
2	Pinball, 1973 1980Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
3	A Wild Sheep Chase 1982Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible
4	Dance, Dance, Dance 1988Buy 🇺🇸🎧 Audible