Audiobooks narrated by Kotaro Watanabe

"A charmingly idiosyncratic look at writing, creativity, and the author's own novels. Haruki Murakami's myriad fans will be delighted by this unique look into the mind of a master storyteller. In this engaging book, the internationally best-selling author and famously reclusive writer shares with readers what he thinks about being a novelist; his thoughts on the role of the novel in our society; his own origins as a writer; and his musings on the sparks of creativity that inspire other writers, artists, and musicians. Readers who have long wondered where the mysterious novelist gets his ideas and what inspires his strangely surreal worlds will be fascinated by this highly personal look at the craft of writing."

Haruki Murakami (Author), Kotaro Watanabe (Narrator)

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How High We Go in the Dark

"Bloomsbury presents How High We Go in the Dark by Sequoia Nagamatsu, read by Jason Culp, Stephanie Komure, Micky Shiloah, Joe Knezevich, Brianna Ishibashi, Kotaro Watanabe, Matthew Bridges, Kurt Kanazawa, Greg Watanabe, Jeanne Sakata, MacLeod Andrews, Keisuke Hoashi, Brian Nishii and Julia Whelan. SHORTLISTED FOR THE WATERSTONES DEBUT FICTION PRIZE 2022 FINALIST FOR THE BARNES & NOBLE DISCOVER PRIZE 2022 FINALIST FOR THE URSULA LE GUIN PRIZE FOR FICTION 2022 WATERSTONES AND ESQUIRE BEST BOOKS OF 2022 For fans of Cloud Atlas and Station Eleven, Sequoia Nagamatsu's debut is a wildly imaginative, genre-bending work spanning generations across the globe as humanity struggles to rebuild itself in the aftermath of a climate plague. ‘Haunting and luminous … An astonishing debut’ – Alan Moore, creator of Watchmen and V for Vendetta 'A powerfully moving and thought provoking read. At times sublime, strange and deeply human' Adrian Tchaikovsky, bestselling author of the Children of Time series Dr. Cliff Miyashiro arrives in the Arctic Circle to continue his recently deceased daughter’s research, only to discover a virus, newly unearthed from melting permafrost. The plague unleashed reshapes life on earth for generations. Yet even while struggling to counter this destructive force, humanity stubbornly persists in myriad moving and ever inventive ways. Among those adjusting to this new normal are an aspiring comedian, employed by a theme park designed for terminally ill children, who falls in love with a mother trying desperately to keep her son alive; a scientist who, having failed to save his own son from the plague, gets a second chance at fatherhood when one of his test subjects—a pig—develops human speech; a man who, after recovering from his own coma, plans a block party for his neighbours who have also woken up to find that they alone have survived their families; and a widowed painter and her teenaged granddaughter who must set off on cosmic quest to locate a new home planet. From funerary skyscrapers to hotels for the dead, How High We Go in the Dark follows a cast of intricately linked characters spanning hundreds of years as humanity endeavours to restore the delicate balance of the world. This is a story of unshakable hope that crosses literary lines to give us a world rebuilding itself through an endless capacity for love, resilience and reinvention. Wonderful and disquieting, dreamlike and all too possible. [How High We Go in the Dark] reaches far beyond our stars while its heart remains rooted to Earth, and reminds us that our wellbeing depends on the wellbeing of our world – Samantha Shannon, author of The Priory of the Orange Tree C 2022 HarperCollins Publishers"

Sequoia Nagamatsu (Author), Brian Nishii, Brianna Ishibashi, Greg Watanabe, Jason Culp, Jeanne Sakata, Joe Knezevich, Julia Whelan, Keisuke Hoashi, Kotaro Watanabe, Kurt Kanazawa, MacLeod Andrews, Matthew Bridges, Micky Shiloah, Stephanie Komure (Narrator)

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Murakami T: The T-Shirts I Love

"Brought to you by Penguin. The international literary icon opens his eclectic closet: Here are photographs of Murakami's extensive and personal T-shirt collection, accompanied by essays that reveal a side of the writer rarely seen by the public. Haruki Murakami's books have galvanized millions around the world. Many of his fans know about his 10,000-vinyl-record collection, and his obsession with running, but few have heard about a more intimate, and perhaps more unique, passion: his T-shirt-collecting habit. In Murakami T, the famously reclusive novelist shows us his T-shirts - including gems found in bookshops, charity shops and record stores - from those featuring whisky, animals, cars and superheroes, to souvenirs of marathons and a Beach Boys concert in Honolulu, to the shirt that inspired the beloved short story 'Tony Takitani'. Accompanied by short, frank essays that have been translated into English for the first time, these photographs reveal much about Murakami's multifaceted and wonderfully eccentric persona. © Haruki Murakami 2021 (P) Penguin Audio 2021"

Haruki Murakami (Author), Kotaro Watanabe (Narrator)

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Kokoro

""Soseki is the representative modern Japanese novelist, a figure of truly national stature."-Haruki Murakami The father of modern Japanese literature's best-loved novel, in its first new English translation in half a century No collection of Japanese literature is complete without Natsume Soseki's Kokoro, his most famous novel and the last he completed before his death. Published here in the first new translation in more than fifty years, Kokoro-meaning 'heart'-is the story of a subtle and poignant friendship between two unnamed characters, a young man and an enigmatic elder whom he calls 'Sensei.' Haunted by tragic secrets that have cast a long shadow over his life, Sensei slowly opens up to his young disciple, confessing indiscretions from his own student days that have left him reeling with guilt, and revealing, in the seemingly unbridgeable chasm between his moral anguish and his student's struggle to understand it, the profound cultural shift from one generation to the next that characterized Japan in the early twentieth century."

Natsume Soseki (Author), Elizabeth Jasicki, Kotaro Watanabe (Narrator)

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Kusamakura

"A stunning new English translation-the first in more than forty years-of a major novel by the father of modern Japanese fiction Natsume Soseki's Kusamakura-meaning "grass pillow"-follows its nameless young artist-narrator on a meandering walking tour of the mountains. At the inn at a hot spring resort, he has a series of mysterious encounters with Nami, the lovely young daughter of the establishment. Nami, or 'beauty,' is the center of this elegant novel, the still point around which the artist moves and the enigmatic subject of Soseki's word painting. In the author's words, Kusamakura is 'a haiku-style novel, that lives through beauty.' Written at a time when Japan was opening its doors to the rest of the world, Kusamakura turns inward, to the pristine mountain idyll and the taciturn lyricism of its courtship scenes, enshrining the essence of old Japan in a work of enchanting literary nostalgia."

Natsume Soseki (Author), Elizabeth Jasicki, Kotaro Watanabe (Narrator)

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First Person Singular: Stories

"Brought to you by Penguin. THE SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER A GUARDIAN AND SUNDAY TIMES 'BOOKS OF 2021' PICK A mindbending new collection of short stories from the unique, internationally acclaimed author of Norwegian Wood and The Wind-up Bird Chronicle. The eight masterly stories in this new collection are all told in the first person by a classic Murakami narrator. From nostalgic memories of youth, meditations on music and an ardent love of baseball to dreamlike scenarios, an encounter with a talking monkey and invented jazz albums, together these stories challenge the boundaries between our minds and the exterior world. Occasionally, a narrator who may or may not be Murakami himself is present. Is it memoir or fiction? The reader decides. Philosophical and mysterious, the stories in First Person Singular all touch beautifully on love and solitude, childhood and memory. . . all with a signature Murakami twist. © Haruki Murakami 2021 (P) Penguin Audio 2021"

Haruki Murakami (Author), Kotaro Watanabe (Narrator)

Audiobook

Audiobooks Narrated by Kotaro Watanabe

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