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Asia

Japan

12 authors in the ranking·15 rated books·14 books set here

BestAuthors12Set here14

This page gathers Japanese authors from the reader ranking, among them Haruki Murakami, Sayaka Murata and Koushun Takami, and books whose story is set in Japan, such as Murakami’s “Kafka on the Shore”. Murata’s “Convenience Store Woman” won the Akutagawa Prize in 2016. In 1968 Yasunari Kawabata became the first Japanese writer to receive the Nobel Prize in Literature.

The most-read authors and their best books

Convenience Store WomanSayaka Murata7.5The Wind-Up Bird ChronicleHaruki Murakami7.9The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying UpMarie Kondō7.4Strange PicturesUketsu7.7Battle RoyaleKoushun Takami8.0The Devotion of Suspect XKeigo Higashino8.0

Authors 12

1. Sayaka Murata1 ranked bookConvenience Store Woman7.5
2. Haruki Murakami2 ranked booksThe Wind-Up Bird Chronicle7.9
3. Marie Kondō1 ranked bookThe Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up7.4
4. Uketsu1 ranked bookStrange Pictures7.7
5. Koushun Takami1 ranked bookBattle Royale8.0
6. Keigo Higashino2 ranked booksThe Devotion of Suspect X8.0
7. Toshikazu Kawaguchi1 ranked bookTales from the Cafe8.0
8. Kōji Suzuki2 ranked booksSpiral7.5
9. Katsuhiro Ōtomo1 ranked bookAkira, Vol. 18.5
10. Junji Itō1 ranked bookSensor7.4
11. Okakura Kakuzō1 ranked bookThe Book of Tea7.7
12. Takuya Asakura1 ranked bookThe Vanishing Cherry Blossom Bookshop7.9

The story is set here 14

Books whose story is set in this country, according to Wikidata and our own additions.

PachinkoMin Jin Lee8.5The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de ZoetDavid Mitchell8.2Kafka on the ShoreHaruki Murakami8.0Memoirs of a GeishaArthur Golden8.0

1. Battle RoyaleKoushun Takami8.0
2. GhostwrittenDavid Mitchell7.9
3. The Wind-Up Bird ChronicleHaruki Murakami7.9
4. IdoruWilliam Gibson7.7
5. Before the Coffee Gets ColdToshikazu Kawaguchi7.7
6. SpiralKōji Suzuki7.5
7. Convenience Store WomanSayaka Murata7.5
8. 1Q84Haruki Murakami7.5
9. RingKōji Suzuki7.5
10. You Only Live TwiceIan Fleming7.4

An author's country is their citizenship in Wikidata or, where none is recorded, the country they were born in; a story's setting comes from Wikidata too. Obvious errors and gaps are corrected by hand. Authors are ordered by the number of reader ratings. Country shapes: Natural Earth.