Misfit: Convenience Store Woman by Sayaka Murata

In the Japanese novel Convenience Store Woman, the protagonist struggles with choosing a lifestyle that her society considers abnormal.

When introverts grow up in a milieu that defines an outgoing, chatty personality as the norm, we inevitably pass through at least a short period of feeling like an oddball.  Although Sayaka Murata’s short novel Convenience Store Woman isn’t exactly about an introvert, its theme is one that introverts may find familiar:  how to deal with the pressure to conform when fitting in would require squeezing one’s oval self into a square hole. The main character resolves this dilemma in a fashion that introverted readers may find both challenging and comforting.