When a man's favourite elephant vanishes, the balance of his whole life is subtly upset; a couple's midnight hunger pangs drive them to hold up a McDonald's; a woman finds she is irresistible to a small green monster that burrows through her front garden;an insomniac wife wakes up to a twilight world of semi-consciousness in which anything seems possible - even death. In every one of the stories that make up The Elephant Vanishes, Murakami makes a determined assault on the normal. He has a deadpan genius for dislocating realities to uncover the surreal in the everyday, the extraordinary in the ordinary.

THE WIND--UP BIRD AND

TUESDAY'S WOMEN

THE SECOND BAKERY ATTACK

THE KANGAROO COMMUNIQUE

ON SEEING THE 100% PERFECT GIRL

ONE BEAUTIFUL APRIL MORNING

SLEEP

THE FALL OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE,

THE 1881 INDIAN UPRISING, HITLER'S

INVASION OF POLAND, AND THE REALM

OF RAGING WINDS

LEDERHOSEN

BARN BURNING

THE LITTLE GREEN MONSTER

FAMILY AFFAIR

A WINDOW

TV PEOPLE

A SLOW BOAT TO CHINA

THE DANCING DWARF

THE LAST LAWN OF THE AFTERNOON

THE SILENCE

THE ELEPHANT VANISHES