Vanishing World by Sayaka Murata—author of the global sensations Convenience Store Woman and Earthlings—is a chilling, imaginative exploration of a society where sex between married couples is taboo and all children are conceived through artificial means. Set in an alternate Japan, this haunting novel dives into the moral and emotional dissonance of a culture that has outlawed intimacy in pursuit of purity.
Through the story of Amane, a woman repulsed by the idea of natural conception yet haunted by her own forbidden desires, Sayaka Murata examines what happens when a society’s obsession with order, control, and moral superiority erases the very chaos that makes us human. As Amane and her husband move to the eerie utopia of Paradise-Eden—where motherhood is collective and even men can carry children—the line between liberation and dehumanization blurs.
Vanishing World is provocative, unsettling, and deeply original. Sayaka Murata continues her masterful dissection of modern alienation and conformity, asking the ultimate question: in a perfectly regulated world, what happens to the heart?