龍

Reads: “Ryu"

Definition: Dragon

RYU Murakami is a Japanese novelist and filmmaker. Because of his last name, he is commonly compared to Haruki Murakami, but the two have distinguishably different styles of writing. While Haruki writes in a poetic and mythical realism, RYU focuses on the dark side of human nature through the themes of disillusion, drugs, murder, war and sex. His most famous novel, Coin Locker Babies, depicts two abandoned boys at birth in a coin locker at a train station in Tokyo.