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Piercing

by Ryu Murakami

A domestic life shadowed by a dangerous impulse

Regular price $16.69 USD
Regular price $27.82 USD Sale price $16.69 USD
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Paperback New English

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Awards & Recognition

  • Editorial selection

    Selected for Literary Hub’s “Ten Works of Literary Horror You Should Read”

    Included in Literary Hub’s “Ten Works of Literary Horror You Should Read (Even if You Don't Think You Like Horro...

AlbakiReads Editorial

A domestic life shadowed by a dangerous impulse

Set in Tokyo, *Piercing* places a private psychological struggle inside an apparently content family life. Kawashima, a graphic designer and new father, secretly wrestles with an urge to harm his baby daughter. His decision to confront that impulse sets events in motion toward possible murder. The premise builds its suspense around the divide between the household’s outward calm and the threat Kawashima carries within it, making the family setting central to the book’s psychological tension.

Good fit for readers who enjoy

  • Adults interested in psychological suspense and stories centered on dangerous impulses.
  • Readers drawn to crime fiction involving family life and the threat of violence.

Themes

Psychological conflictViolence and impulseFamily and secrecyAppearance versus private reality

Based on publisher information and book metadata.

Book overview

"Mr. Murakami's novels are filled with entertaining psychopaths."--The New York Times

A pulsating cult-favorite psycho-thriller, the basis of the major motion picture starring Christopher Abbott and Mia Wasikowska


*One of Literary Hub's "Ten Works of Literary Horror You Should Read (Even if You Don't Think You Like Horror)"*

Kawashima Masayuki is a successful graphic designer living in Tokyo with his loving wife, Yoko, and their baby girl. Outwardly, their lives are a picture of happiness and contentment, but every night while his wife sleeps Kawashima creeds from him bed and watches over the baby's crib with an ice pick in his hand and an almost visceral desire to use it.

One night, as this struggle unfolds once more, Kawashima makes a decision to confront his demons and sets into motion an uncontrollable chain of events seeming to lead inexorably to murder. The follow-up to In the Miso Soup from a cult favorite writer, Piercing confirms Murakami as the master of the psycho thriller--terrifying, sickening, and utterly gripping.
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