Convenience Store Woman
A woman who has worked in a convenience store for eighteen years resists pressure from society to conform to expectations of marriage and career.
Where Convenience Store Woman keeps showing up
Four of our editors' lists feature this novel.
Books in conversation with Convenience Store Woman
A few of the closest reads from our full list.
What you might want to know about Convenience Store Woman
The questions readers send us most often, answered without spoilers.
For eighteen years, thirty-six-year-old Keiko has worked part time at the same Tokyo convenience store, mimicking her coworkers to seem normal. Family pressure to marry coincides with the arrival of a difficult new hire.
Convenience Store Woman is fictional but Sayaka Murata worked at a Tokyo convenience store while writing her early novels. The setting and routines are drawn from her own experience, though the protagonist Keiko is invented.
No. Convenience Store Woman is short and stylistically clear, with a flat, observational first-person voice. The English translation by Ginny Tapley Takemori is widely praised. It is often recommended as an entry to contemporary Japanese fiction.
Convenience Store Woman was written by Sayaka Murata, published in 2018 by Grove Press.
Convenience Store Woman is 163 pages in standard print editions, though page counts vary slightly between hardcover, paperback, and large-print formats.
At an average reading pace of about 250 words per minute, Convenience Store Woman takes most readers 2 to 4 hours to finish.
Convenience Store Woman is a standalone novel by Sayaka Murata, not part of a series.
Convenience Store Woman is available in hardcover, paperback, ebook, and audiobook formats from Amazon, Bookshop.org, ThriftBooks, and most major bookstores.
