Review by Esra Tur
Japan is for me was mystery, kind and healthy peoples land, who apparently live longer than any other nationalities. Country was not at the top of my land to visit list till I come across one of Haruki Murakami’s book. The first book I read from Murakami was “Kafka on the Shore” and that was my least favorite Murakami’s book.
Despite I have not been enjoying that book I have not given up on him and I have tried his books once again this how my story with Murakami started… If I like an authors I am easily tempted to read author’s others book one after another. But this time situation was different I was not only liked an author and his books, I was also very much interested in a country and its culture as well.
Murakami’s life is as interesting as his novels. One day when he was watching a baseball game he felt intolerable desire for writing, this is how he began to his writing journey. Since then he has been writing and could easily be called one of the most successful and productive Japanese authors of all time. He describe himself as a surrealist but write his books as plain as possible. No one could have a difficulty to read his novels. There is something beautifully shocking in the way he writes, as charming as possible in most plain way. It takes time to get out of world he is creating in his novels.
Let’s have a look at the main characters as well as plot of the book and try to get a sense what he was intent to share with us. Our main character is Toro Okada and when the novel began he is a jobless man who spending his day doing nothing but house chores. Then his life began to change since he get down in a waterless well. His wife Kumiko Okada is a journalist and she disappeared at the beginning of the novel, her story not only very mysterious and also had very crucial role in integrity of the plot.
Maya Kasahara is a girl next door, who become Okada’s weird but not very dull friend. She is keep showing up in the novel during the story. Malta Kano is a medium who only wear very bright red hat. And she works with her sister Girit Kano, whose life is full agony as well as physical and mental pains. Readers not exactly knowing how the story of each character ended it but Murakami had a happy ending for Girit Kano. Noboru Vatay is Kumiko’s brother never get along well with Okada. Vatay is a mean spirited politician and Okada’s enemy. He is at the outset and ending of mysterious events.
Lieutenant Mamiye had great pains and unforgettable memories from Second World War he had suffered from detention camps and despite his advanced aged he still very much in pain and still alive. Through Mamiye character Murakami analyzed effect of Chines und Japanese wars and its effect on society. Thanks Murakamis very realist description we could not only well informed but also horrified by witnessing all sort of cruelties, that has been took place during war. For those had not ideas about for sure it is very informative but in the integrity of story Mammiyes story is too long which one can easily lose interest in it.
As a normal phrase of any Murakami’s book readers are realizing that on the way of the story many character are disappearing while new ones keep showing up. Muskat Akasaka is one of them. She is cleaning freak who could not be a friend with someone who is not fancy enough and she is the one who patronizing Okada. Her character spice it up the plot. She had a son who never speak and his name is Tarçın Akasaka. When we comes to our supported characters we having winder bird and Kumiko’s and Okada’s cat called Noboru Vatay, which later renamed as Uskumru.
Let’s begin with our review from here…
Novel centered Okada’s und Kumikos’s marriage. Okada used to work in attorney office when the novel began then we learned that he had quit his job without a meaningful reason and he is jobless. 30 years old Okada somehow getting used to his new normal and dealing with mostly household. His happy and ordinary life and marriage began to change since couple’s cat Noboru Vatay’s went missing.
In the novel we see that surrealistic and interconnected incident began to occur since Okada began to looking for his cat. During this journey Okada in some point missing at where he is no longer sure where the story has begun and what is real or unreal anymore. His real life events interlock with his imagination. At some point you don’t know what is really happening whether it’s a real action or a dream took place in Okada’s mind.
Okada having many dreams and those dreams are mostly concerned with sexuality. He is having a sex in his dreams with one of those womans in his life but not know who this woman actually is. Novel is full of very strange woman who’s making Okada’s already very much blurry mind even worst. He is remembering those times as delusion.
In his world many supernatural incident happened. People are walking through walls, he suddenly get a blue mark on his check which helped persons who had mental disorders. Okada’s patients are mostly woman. And those women’s paid well. Reality is always interlock with illusions.
Mysterious medium sisters, Miyaki’s abandoned house and their open-ended well, all those horrified details form China und Japanese war interconnected with each other very fluently. Those are only e few things that subconsciously inclusion you in the plot.
Thanks to all those very much clos-knit events construction the novels tempo almost never slow it down. Because of all those metaphysic as well as scientific details such as paranormal incidents, parallel universes and time twist, the novel had a some sort of fantastic fiction air about. The Novel is has an open-ended ending because Murakami likes to leave almost everything open ended and he has an intention that his novels ended whichever reader want to ended. He leaves that to reader’s imagination.
Esrasbooks 