Haruki Murakami

dots03

so I wanted to get people's opinions on which Haruki Murakami book I should read next. I've read 'Kafka on the shore' which I really enjoyed, even though I was slightly underwhelmed with the ending.

1Q84 looks like an interesting read and I'll pick it up eventually, but I want to hit his back catalogue first.

Norwegian Wood seems a good choice as I can check out the film afterwards which is something I always find an interesting excercise, but I'd rather pick one of his more unconventional novels...or maybe Norwegian Wood is a must (and not than conventional).

Any recommendations or thoughts.

Kinski

Read A Wild Sheep Chase, Norwegian Wood and his short story collection Blind Willow, Sleeping Woman. Sheep Chase is my personal favourite. I'm one of the few Murakami fans who was underwhelmed by The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle, but that is his most acclaimed novel, so you should read that too.

I haven't read Kafka, so I can't know what your issue with the ending was, but if you expect neat conclusions which wrap things up completely, you won't get that from Murakami.

baconsarnie

Kinski: "I'm one of the few Murakami fans who was underwhelmed by The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle"

Snap!I'd recommend Norewgian Wood in a heartbeat though.

(couldn't get the quote function to work this morning. Boards.ie also suffering from Mondayitis).

johnny_ultimate

Most of his stuff is well worth checking out. The only one I was underwhelmed by was After Dark, which was grand but just more disposable than his other stuff.

Kafka on the Shore is my favourite for sheer intensity of vision, but there's plenty of others that impressed equally. Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World is wonderful - odd, meandering and very-Murakmai. It's more fantastical than the rest of his work (not that he's not a fantastical author :pac:), so possibly not for everyone.

A Wild Sheep Chase is good, but personally I was more impressed by its sequel Dance Dance Dance. It's worth reading both together, obviously! You could probably read the latter separately, but you'd be missing out on the many joys of the former and miss many of the narrative connections.

Unlike the two posters above, I loved Wind-Up Bird Chronicle although perhaps not as much as the ones above. Norwegian Wood is great too, although it's the least Murakami-esque of all his novels. Not to take away from its many, many strengths, but it's very different to everything the came before and after it. It's an achingly nostalgic, though, and a really honest look back at young adulthood. Sputnik Sweetheart is an interesting book but again slightly more disposable than his best.

Only found out IQ84 was coming out in October - still thought it was a good few months away, so delighted about that. I was over in Japan around the time book one was released over there (2009) so have been dying to read it since then!

SVG

Add me to the list of people who were underwhelmed by The Wind-up Bird Chronicle! It's probably due to the fact that I had heard it was his masterpiece and I read it after his other books so my expectations were way too high. I'd still recommend it but it didn't hit me like some of his other stuff. That bit with the well in the desert has really stuck with me though.

Dance Dance Dance is definitely my favourite of his. It has a great dreamlike atmosphere. I also love the description of the protagonist's job (he's a freelance writer) as "shovelling cultural snow"- it often comes to mind when I see umpteen articles based on the same press release.

FruitLover

I wouldn't exactly call Norwegian Wood 'conventional', just less bananas than his usual stuff.

Luckily, I hadn't heard a thing about W-UBC before I read it, and loved it. My number one favourite so far though, is Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World.

dots03

Thanks all for the replies and insights.

I think I'll give Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World a shot next. It seems there may be a sci-fi type element to it which appeals to me. I also find Murakami reminds me a little of David Mitchell (or vice versa) and from reading a few descriptions of 'Hard Boiled..' I concluded there may perhaps be echoes of Cloud Atlas.

Cavehill Red

dots03 wrote: »

Thanks all for the replies and insights.

I think I'll give Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World a shot next. It seems there may be a sci-fi type element to it which appeals to me. I also find Murakami reminds me a little of David Mitchell (or vice versa) and from reading a few descriptions of 'Hard Boiled..' I concluded there may perhaps be echoes of Cloud Atlas.

Love Mitchell's work, but there's no doubt at all that he owes Murakami his career. The influence here ran clearly in one direction.

Giruilla

Stopped reading Norweigan Wood about half way through as got so boring and also was way too emotional for my liking. Are his other books any better?

johnny_ultimate

Yeah the rest of his books are far more surreal and abstract than Norwegian Wood. Not really sure how a novel can be top emotional though?

Im on a David Mitchell buzz at the moment and there's definite Murakami in there. On number9dream at the moment which is most obviously channeling Murakami with its undefined concept of reality. Im not really buying its vision of Tokyo despite the novels many strengths though. Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet is wonderful however. Definitely shows him as a writer with a unique voice rather than just a talented mimic.

Dades

Loved the The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle, but Hard-Boiled Wonderland... bored me to tears.

Meh!

Giruilla

johnny_ultimate wrote: »

Yeah the rest of his books are far more surreal and abstract than Norwegian Wood. Not really sure how a novel can be top emotional though?

I probably was unlucky with reading that one first so. Obviously every story need to be emotionally driven, but I just thought Norwegian Wood was relentless in 'isolated characters struggling to understand their emotions'.
Can only imagine the film to be awful considering how overly melodramatic modern Japanese cinema is!

johnny_ultimate

The film is beautiful visually - there's a fantastic atmosphere to it. And Kiko Mizuhara and Rinko Kikuchi are fantastic (in that order) as Midori and Naoko. But otherwise its a very simplistic and laboured reading of the novel, and suffers greatly from making Watanabe and some of the side characters non-entities. I still liked it, but boy an awful lot of people outright hated it, and I can easily see where they're coming from.

I do think as far as angsty portraits of teenage romance go, Norwegian Wood is easily a highlight of that often dreadful genre. The characters just feel very real and likable - one of the few romances where both love interests are equally endearing, and Watanabe is stuck genuinely and believably stuck between the two. Each to their own though It would definitely be a shame to disregard the rest of his stuff if you didn't like that though - its easily the least representative of his style and individuality.

Giruilla

johnny_ultimate wrote: »

It would definitely be a shame to disregard the rest of his stuff if you didn't like that though - its easily the least representative of his style and individuality.

Thats good to hear! I was confused to why so many people recommended him after (half) reading NW, but I'm tempted to try another one of his books now!

David Mitchell also sounds interesting. Any recommendation on which book to start with?

spanx

I'd only read What I Talk About When I Talk About Running and I really liked it (doing the marathon this year, thanks Haruki).

Started 1Q84 yesterday and I love it already. Really distinctive style, interesting story, translation feels very solid.

johnny_ultimate

Giruilla wrote: »

David Mitchell also sounds interesting. Any recommendation on which book to start with?

Cloud Atlus is his best known and a pretty fascinating read. It's not necessarily an easy read - everytime you get used to the narrative style Mitchell cruelly yanks it away from under you and introduces an entirely different one - but the rewards are plentiful.

I loved Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet though. I'd heard it was dense, and it might be if you're unfamiliar with Japanese culture / strongly against historical fiction. But personally I thought it was surprisingly reader friendly, and the story takes some extremely unexpected twists as it goes on.

Giruilla

Thanks, both sounds great! Will prob try Cloud Atlas.

Psychedelic

Norwegian Wood was awful, of what I can remember of it anyway, which isn't much. The narrator sleeps with every female character in the book, and the many sex scenes are really cringeworthy. The book also tries too hard to be cool by namedropping loads of 60's pop tunes, which was annoying. Not much of a story to it either, just some ansgty characters growing up.

That book totally put me off reading anything else by Murakami. Tempted to try out his surreal books but not going to risk being burned again.

Ian7

wow, i should have searched for this thread ages ago, but anyway. Growing up I was never one for reading but have in recent years began to embrace books in a big way. I loved reading Iain Banks' books but just couldn't find anything that interested me as much as his work until Murakami was suggested to me by a friend. I picked up After Dark before a holiday to Japan and for nostalgic reasons that would be my favorite even if it is a bit on the short side.

It's interesting to see that everyone here seems to have a different favourite HM novel. The reaction to Norwegian Wood is also interesting. I feel it would be a crime to commit Murakami to a single genre, writing only works of abstract ideas. Norwegian Wood is a solid story and shows that he is more than capable of writing something other than a fantastical work of fiction.

Almost finished Kafka, I would highly recommend it and not just for it's completely bonkers plot but also for it's strong descriptive passages. (possibly not one to recommend to your mother though)

By the way, would anyone recommend reading Orwell's 1984 before HM's 1Q84? I've heard it's a homage to that book but maybe it's just the title?

Bodhidharma

Read ALL of Murakami's work. Greatest writer alive.

Ian7

Psychedelic wrote: »

Norwegian Wood was awful, of what I can remember of it anyway, which isn't much. The narrator sleeps with every female character in the book, and the many sex scenes are really cringeworthy. The book also tries too hard to be cool by namedropping loads of 60's pop tunes, which was annoying. Not much of a story to it either, just some ansgty characters growing up.

That book totally put me off reading anything else by Murakami. Tempted to try out his surreal books but not going to risk being burned again.

Ah don't be put off, give him another go! Maybe you have though, since you last posted here.

About the namedropping of songs, i don't know if it was his goal is to make the book seem "cool". The title itself and that song is an intricate part of the plot as is the idea of the main characters sitting listening to various songs. As he needs a way to develop that idea, it would be strange if the songs weren't named. I also believe it's a method he uses to build the characters, their personalities and where they fit in, in society and also time. It's a common method he uses throughout his works to build characters and environments... perhaps not as strongly used in other novels as 'Norwegian wood' though.
Also, you have to remember that 1960's Japan was a completely different environment to that of the west so the context in which characters are listening to western artists would be interpreted completely different between Japanese and western readers.

Kinski

Ian7 wrote: »

About the namedropping of songs, i don't know if it was his goal is to make the book seem "cool". The title itself and that song is an intricate part of the plot as is the idea of the main characters sitting listening to various songs. As he needs a way to develop that idea, it would be strange if the songs weren't named. I also believe it's a method he uses to build the characters, their personalities and where they fit in, in society and also time. It's a common method he uses throughout his works to build characters and environments... perhaps not as strongly used in other novels as 'Norwegian wood' though.

Murakami used to run a jazz club with his wife; music is clearly very important to him. 1Q84 is also peppered with references to musical performers and compositions, culled from a variety of genres.

The Mad Hatter

Cavehill Red wrote: »

Love Mitchell's work, but there's no doubt at all that he owes Murakami his career. The influence here ran clearly in one direction.

I don't think that's true at all - there's plenty of Nabokov in there too, and a touch of Neil Gaiman (and plenty of others too, but I can't think of any more off the top of my head). number9dream is steeped in Murakami even more than his other work, though.

As for Murakami, I quite like his work, in particular The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle and After Dark, but some of his stylistic traits - especially his tendency to introduce virtually every female character with a physical description and a comment on their attractiveness - grate on me.

Ian7

Kinski wrote: »

music is clearly very important to him.

I don't doubt that for a second

The Mad Hatter

Kinski wrote: »

Murakami used to run a jazz club with his wife; music is clearly very important to him. 1Q84 is also peppered with references to musical performers and compositions, culled from a variety of genres.

He has an enormous record collection - some 40,000 discs. At the end of last week's Selected Shorts podcast, which was devoted to Murakami, there's a talk by the author John Wray, in part discussing record shopping with the man in New York.

Ian7

40,000? :eek: That's crazy and pretty cool, must have a listen to that podcast later.

I still think there is more to the namedropping than just a love of music though. He doesn't strike me as a "willy nilly" type of author.

Walter White

Bodhidharma wrote: »

Read ALL of Murakami's work. Greatest writer alive.

Heard great things about Murakami... So I am half way through 1Q84 and finding it very hard going, he just keeps rambling off in different directions for no apparent reason, no wonder its so long.... But my question is.. Is it worth persevering with ?

Ian7

Walter White wrote: »

Is it worth persevering with ?

Even though you find it hard going and rambling, are you enjoying it at all? I haven't started that book myself but I am looking forward to it, I presume you know there's three parts to that yeah? Maybe it's a touch of OCD but i think if I was that far through a book that big I would have to keep going even if I didn't like it very much.

Walter White wrote: »

he just keeps rambling off in different directions for no apparent reason

As I said I haven't read that book, but as funny as it sounds, the ramblings for no apparent reason are probably meticulously thought out or I am giving him too much credit?:o

Bodhidharma

Walter White wrote: »

Heard great things about Murakami... So I am half way through 1Q84 and finding it very hard going, he just keeps rambling off in different directions for no apparent reason, no wonder its so long.... But my question is.. Is it worth persevering with ?

Yes. It's quite an abstract work with a lot of stuff that seems odd, but I'm reading it myself (just started the third book) and it does get better.

Walter White

Ian7 wrote: »

Even though you find it hard going and rambling, are you enjoying it at all?

Yeah I am enjoying it, the characters are excellent and when its not rambling its very good...



As I said I haven't read that book, but as funny as it sounds, the ramblings for no apparent reason are probably meticulously thought out or I am giving him too much credit?:o

I think you are giving too much credit there...

Also good to hear from Bodhidharma that it keeps getting better in book 3... I think i will finish it, as the further i get into it the I want to know how it will turn out..;)

KindOfIrish

Bodhidharma wrote: »

Read ALL of Murakami's work. Greatest writer alive.

I agree. It is a modern classic!

Malari

I'm about half way through the 3rd book of 1Q84 and love it! It's amazing how Murakami can keep your interest despite relatively little action in the story.

Does anyone else find it strange that Aomame is always referred to by her last name and Tengo by his first?

Kinski

Malari wrote: »

I'm about half way through the 3rd book of 1Q84 and love it! It's amazing how Murakami can keep your interest despite relatively little action in the story.

Does anyone else find it strange that Aomame is always referred to by her last name and Tengo by his first?

A minor bugbear of mine is that his translators always reverse the Japanese name order. They should leave the surname first and just include a note pointing it out to the reader at the start.

1Q84 is both the best and worst novel I've read by him yet; it's an odd one.

Walter White

1Q84 is both the best and worst novel I've read by him yet; it's an odd one.[/QUOTE]


Now that is really odd... The best and worst !! There is no doubt he is a very good writer, but I don't know how anyone can write so much and the story not actually move on...:(

Malari

Kinski wrote: »

A minor bugbear of mine is that his translators always reverse the Japanese name order. They should leave the surname first and just include a note pointing it out to the reader at the start.

1Q84 is both the best and worst novel I've read by him yet; it's an odd one.

I thought Aomame was her surname because they mention her brother was X Aomame. And Tengo's dad is referred to as Mr. Kawana? I'm just curious!

Kinski

Malari wrote: »

I thought Aomame was her surname because they mention her brother was X Aomame. And Tengo's dad is referred to as Mr. Kawana? I'm just curious!

Yeah, you're right. But in the original Japanese, it would have been Kawana Tengo, just like it would be Murakami Haruki.

I kept forgetting that Aomame wasn't her first name. I have no idea what the significance of it was.

Walter White wrote: »

Now that is really odd... The best and worst !! There is no doubt he is a very good writer, but I don't know how anyone can write so much and the story not actually move on...:(

There's a lot that's good about it. But, to take a couple of not-so-good examples, Tengo is the sort of personality-vacuum that Murakami seems to favour when creating male protagonists (and I came close to hurling the book across the room during some of the many digressions describing exactly what he had for dinner), and there are a ton of just-shoved-in-there-for-convenience aspects to the plot.

triseke

loved "dance, dance, dance"

ValJester

Really enjoyed everything Murakami I've read so far, his prose is just a joy. That said, "South Of The Border, West Of The Sun" stands out, it's so brilliantly concise a distillation of that side of his writing.

Walter White

There's a lot that's good about it. But, to take a couple of not-so-good examples, Tengo is the sort of personality-vacuum that Murakami seems to favour when creating male protagonists (and I came close to hurling the book across the room during some of the many digressions describing exactly what he had for dinner), and there are a ton of just-shoved-in-there-for-convenience aspects to the plot.

Exactly.. He could have wrote a much better flowing story if he just cut out all the meandering.... Instead of 1000+ pages 400 would have done... He should have got Tengo to do the re-write..

Bodhidharma

The reason she's called Aomame is because it's such an odd name, therefore it singles her out as an oddity. Tengo on the other hand, while having special qualities, isn't particularly different, and is basically a conduit between Aomame and Fuka-Eri. Thats my guess anyway.

I LOVE Murakami, and have read everything (including Pinball, 1973 and Hear the Wind Sing) and while I understand the criticism of 1Q84 I dont agree with it. Yes it could have been shorter, but I love reading his words. His stories have never been particularly linear or conclusive so I think complaining about not much happening is missing his style (though not necessarily the point).

I would say that its probably a difficult read if you're not used to him, but it is a great book.

Kinski

Bodhidharma wrote: »

I LOVE Murakami, and have read everything (including Pinball, 1973 and Hear the Wind Sing) and while I understand the criticism of 1Q84 I dont agree with it. Yes it could have been shorter, but I love reading his words.

I actually thought his prose style was quite uneven in 1Q84, with a number of sloppy sentences and cliches to be found squatting here and there in the text (not going looking for an example right now, though).

His stories have never been particularly linear or conclusive so I think complaining about not much happening is missing his style (though not necessarily the point).

My problems with the plot have nothing to do with "not much happening" (I thought the pace fairly brisk for such a long novel, Tengo's culinary shenanigans aside) or the usual tangle of loose-ends (which are part of the fun with any Murakami). Rather, it was the huge plot-holes and convenient twists which threatened to ruin the story.

For example, when Ushikawa goes to spy on Tengo's apartment, he tries to rent a property across the street, in what we are told is a surprisingly cheap and therefore very popular building. How will the devious and resourceful Ushikawa secure a spot in the building? Oh, someone moved out last week, so he can just have that apartment. When a writer poses an interesting dramatic question, and then answers it in such a boring and lazy way, I as a reader feel short-changed.

That's a minor example, but it's symptomatic of how Murakami repeatedly sucks the dramatic tension from the novel.

Much more serious is the whole business with Sakigake and the assassination of the Leader. So Aomame is sent by the wealthy dowger to kill the leader of Sakigake, a cult-figure so charismatic that half of his followers buggered off to form a different cult. Aomame is told that this will have to be her last job. Sakigake will hunt her down relentlessly, so she will have to give up her role as an avenger of wronged women (taking her peculiar talent into retirement with her) and go into hiding, changing her name and even her face.

Just how far does Sakigake's reach extend? Well, in a nation of several islands with around 100million people, they are entirely localised in one spot. Okay, but they've got loads of money and connections, right? Er, they don't seem all that popular with the authorities, what with their murderous counterparts in the splinter cult, and they make a living growing and selling vegetables or some such bollocks, which I suppose grants them slightly more financial clout than the average market street vegetable stall holder. Fearsome indeed...

Now, they don't seem to have lots of members, any influence with the authorities, or an exceptional amount of money, but the members they have could still be total bad-asses. Their leader certainly is. So Aomame goes to whack this guy...and jeopardises the entire mission by putting a handgun in her damn shoulder bag. My God, the paranoiacs surrounding Leader are so going to look in there!!! Oh no, it's alright, they didn't bother. "Amateurs," thinks Aomame. "Then why the **** are you giving up and going into hiding after this?!!" thinks me.

The scene in which Aomame confronts Leader is brilliantly realised, and would drip with tension if it weren't for all this other bollocks surrounding it. All I could think at this stage is that Sakigake, a bunch of soon-to-be-Leaderless amateurs, are going to have to go looking for Aomame, who could go anywhere in the world to hide. Hell, she could just stay in Japan. She's got the unswerving support of the dowager, who has loads of money and a seemingly elite personal security team, and Japan's a densely-populated place. With her millionaire-backer, network of personal security, and whole ****ing country to hide in, searching for her would be like trying to find a specific needle in a very large haystack full of other needles, with needles sticking out of the sides so when you try to look through it you get pricked by needles.

Which is a long-winded way of saying that 1Q84 ain't no masterpiece. While I consider Murakami to be a master short-story writer, and love early novels like A Wild Sheep Chase, I feel he's never lived up to his potential as a novelist. After 1Q84, and at this late stage of his career, I doubt he ever will.

Walter White

Kinski wrote: »

I actually thought his prose style was quite uneven in 1Q84, with a number of sloppy sentences and cliches to be found squatting here and there in the text (not going looking for an example right now, though).



My problems with the plot have nothing to do with "not much happening" (I thought the pace fairly brisk for such a long novel, Tengo's culinary shenanigans aside) or the usual tangle of loose-ends (which are part of the fun with any Murakami). Rather, it was the huge plot-holes and convenient twists which threatened to ruin the story.

For example, when Ushikawa goes to spy on Tengo's apartment, he tries to rent a property across the street, in what we are told is a surprisingly cheap and therefore very popular building. How will the devious and resourceful Ushikawa secure a spot in the building? Oh, someone moved out last week, so he can just have that apartment. When a writer poses an interesting dramatic question, and then answers it in such a boring and lazy way, I as a reader feel short-changed.

That's a minor example, but it's symptomatic of how Murakami repeatedly sucks the dramatic tension from the novel.

Much more serious is the whole business with Sakigake and the assassination of the Leader. So Aomame is sent by the wealthy dowger to kill the leader of Sakigake, a cult-figure so charismatic that half of his followers buggered off to form a different cult. Aomame is told that this will have to be her last job. Sakigake will hunt her down relentlessly, so she will have to give up her role as an avenger of wronged women (taking her peculiar talent into retirement with her) and go into hiding, changing her name and even her face.

Just how far does Sakigake's reach extend? Well, in a nation of several islands with around 100million people, they are entirely localised in one spot. Okay, but they've got loads of money and connections, right? Er, they don't seem all that popular with the authorities, what with their murderous counterparts in the splinter cult, and they make a living growing and selling vegetables or some such bollocks, which I suppose grants them slightly more financial clout than the average market street vegetable stall holder. Fearsome indeed...

Now, they don't seem to have lots of members, any influence with the authorities, or an exceptional amount of money, but the members they have could still be total bad-asses. Their leader certainly is. So Aomame goes to whack this guy...and jeopardises the entire mission by putting a handgun in her damn shoulder bag. My God, the paranoiacs surrounding Leader are so going to look in there!!! Oh no, it's alright, they didn't bother. "Amateurs," thinks Aomame. "Then why the **** are you giving up and going into hiding after this?!!" thinks me.

The scene in which Aomame confronts Leader is brilliantly realised, and would drip with tension if it weren't for all this other bollocks surrounding it. All I could think at this stage is that Sakigake, a bunch of soon-to-be-Leaderless amateurs, are going to have to go looking for Aomame, who could go anywhere in the world to hide. Hell, she could just stay in Japan. She's got the unswerving support of the dowager, who has loads of money and a seemingly elite personal security team, and Japan's a densely-populated place. With her millionaire-backer, network of personal security, and whole ****ing country to hide in, searching for her would be like trying to find a specific needle in a very large haystack full of other needles, with needles sticking out of the sides so when you try to look through it you get pricked by needles.

Which is a long-winded way of saying that 1Q84 ain't no masterpiece. While I consider Murakami to be a master short-story writer, and love early novels like A Wild Sheep Chase, I feel he's never lived up to his potential as a novelist. After 1Q84, and at this late stage of his career, I doubt he ever will.

Couldn't have put it better myself....

stick girl

If you can find 'The Elephant vanishes', it's a lovely collection of short stories

Bodhidharma

Kinski wrote: »

For example, when Ushikawa goes to spy on Tengo's apartment, he tries to rent a property across the street, in what we are told is a surprisingly cheap and therefore very popular building. How will the devious and resourceful Ushikawa secure a spot in the building? Oh, someone moved out last week, so he can just have that apartment.

Much more serious is the whole business with Sakigake and the assassination of the Leader.

I can see where you're coming from with these but it didn't bother me in the least. If could be argued that

the little people influenced the neighbour to leave in order to help in the capture of Aomame and secondly Sagikake WERE very powerful and influential when Leader was there (because of the influence of the little people). The Dowager didn't know he actually had powers and probably underestimated his influence on the organisation, which crumbled in his absence

.

My two cents

Walter White

KindOfIrish wrote: »

I agree. It is a modern classic!

Modern classic... Give me a break, I have just finished it and what a load of crap.... I persisted with it because so many people said how great it was and what a great writer he is.. It wandered all over the place for 1100 pages and then produced a cop-out ending in the last few pages.... What a disaster, I could have read 3 good books instead.... :mad: