Published April 13, 2017 by DuMont Buchverlag GmbH.
Definitely not my favorites of Murakami’s. While I love the enigmatic nature of the story, it just falls a tad short with the book feeling a little uninspired and as though it was missing many of the key everyday minutiae that makes Murakami’s stories, his.
A stand-alone Harville-Secker edition published to commemorate [a:Haruki Murakami|3354|Haruki Murakami|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1615497402p2/3354.jpg]'s 70th birthday, 'Birthday Girl' is actually part of a larger collection of short stories collated and curated by Murakami, [b:Birthday Stories: Selected and Introduced by Haruki Murakami|18483648|Birthday Stories Selected and Introduced by Haruki Murakami|Haruki Murakami|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1378995724l/18483648.SY75.jpg|4391].
The story is typical of Murakami's oeuvre, layering a tale without revealing elements of it. In a chic Italian restaurant in the Roppongi district of Tokyo, a woman who works there as a waiter is forced by circumstances to work there on the day of her 20th birthday (20 is considered as 'coming of age' in Japan). A bizarre series of episodes plays out, and the woman gets to meet the reclusive restaurant owner, who grants her a wish on the occasion of her birthday, which he guarantees her will come true. The reader is never privy to what the wish …
A stand-alone Harville-Secker edition published to commemorate [a:Haruki Murakami|3354|Haruki Murakami|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1615497402p2/3354.jpg]'s 70th birthday, 'Birthday Girl' is actually part of a larger collection of short stories collated and curated by Murakami, [b:Birthday Stories: Selected and Introduced by Haruki Murakami|18483648|Birthday Stories Selected and Introduced by Haruki Murakami|Haruki Murakami|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1378995724l/18483648.SY75.jpg|4391].
The story is typical of Murakami's oeuvre, layering a tale without revealing elements of it. In a chic Italian restaurant in the Roppongi district of Tokyo, a woman who works there as a waiter is forced by circumstances to work there on the day of her 20th birthday (20 is considered as 'coming of age' in Japan). A bizarre series of episodes plays out, and the woman gets to meet the reclusive restaurant owner, who grants her a wish on the occasion of her birthday, which he guarantees her will come true. The reader is never privy to what the wish was, or even whether it came true.
In trademark Murakami fashion, the story creates more questions than answers. What was the wish? Did it come true? Why was the owner certain he could grant the wish? Why did the woman experience this on her 20th? By subtly focusing on the experience of life itself, rather than the questions and answers which seek to trivialise it, Murakami infuses life with a quotidian magic, something that each one of us can look for and find, if we open ourselves to the possibility of it.
