Goodreads | The Wind-up Bird Chronicle

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Kelly rated it:

07/14/08

bookshelves: fiction

I absolutely adored the book upon starting out. It is exquisitely crafted, with each seemingly casual word chosen to illustrate the world into which we have entered. It is a lonely world full of half finished stories, abrupt departures, missed connections and deep silences. "Poor Mr. Wind-Up Bird," lives on an alley with no exits, in a borrowed life that he could never afford to live without the kindness of his uncle. He's just quit his job, as he has no idea of where to go with his li...more I absolutely adored the book upon starting out. It is exquisitely crafted, with each seemingly casual word chosen to illustrate the world into which we have entered. It is a lonely world full of half finished stories, abrupt departures, missed connections and deep silences. "Poor Mr. Wind-Up Bird," lives on an alley with no exits, in a borrowed life that he could never afford to live without the kindness of his uncle. He's just quit his job, as he has no idea of where to go with his life, but is dissatisfied with its current course. He lives with a wife that he never seems to really speak to, in a routine existence in which she is often late or absent, or spends her time repressing everything she chooses to say to him. Murakami meticulously illustrates this quietly painful existence in all of Mr. Wind-Up Bird's movements, whether it is missed phone calls, a wasted dinner, or a frozen statue of a bird never able to take flight. This sort of language kept me going throughout the book even when I lost my patience with other things.

Mr. Wind-Up Bird's relationship with May Kashara was my favorite part of the book. She is something of a wise child character, able to distill what Murakami is only hinting at into a more obvious, if odd and seemingly quaint statement. She is a wonderful character who brings light and movement to the pages, and pushes the plot along, if only in Mr. Wind-Up Bird's head. I kept looking ahead, if only to find out how long it was until she appeared again.

What I did not like? The endless repetition of the spiritual mumbo-jumbo, of the prophets who "just know," when something is going to happen, of the endless discussion of the "flow," and various other points of odd zen claptrap that really pushed me out of the story, and the reader entirely out of the reality. I think a part of the book's charm is that it hovers so close around the edges of reality, and gradually, this book just seemed to leave that behind. I appreciated the message of a bundle of stories all being woven together, stories that stop and start as people pass through them, are read and discarded as they are of use. But this went far beyond the borders of surreality into geniune, 'WTF?' territory. Perhaps I missed something, and I sort of regret it, but it was really... just a lot to push myself through. That entire middle section with the extended stories of Cinammon and Nutmeg, and the increasing weirdness of Creta Kano, the side stories of Lieutenant Mamiya, etc... I really really lost patience with the book and almost gave up several times, because that's how I thought the rest of the book would be. Many odd people professing they "just know," things and are able to solve things with special powers! What? No. The introduction of random characters and tales that are really not material to the plot, or necessary to the points that Murakami is making, etc.

Thankfully, the tale wound back down into a more manageable area towards the end. I'm glad I finished it, if only to see the end of May Kashara.

I wish I had loved this more consistently that it turned out that I did. I wish I could give it 3.5 stars. I'm sticking with the definition of the stars in terms of "liked it," or "loved it." I was somewhere schizophrenically in between, depending on the section of the book.

Ed Note the 2nd: Page 375- I was really, /really/ starting to lose patience with this. And 100 pages ago, I would've said that you were crazy if you thought that I would say that 100 pages later. The same rounds of psychic weirdness and cliched Zen claptrap was reeeally wearing thin. But now the plot is moving again, and the philsophy is combining with things /happening/, and I'm okay.

Ed Note: I'm just starting book two (about 175 pages in). I'll say this. It is a book for which I automatically picked up my pen after the first page, and I've been underlining and circling like crazy ever since. There is so much to explore with this surreal trip through back fake-alley Japan, both in terms of writing technique and theme. At this point, I'm just still fascinated by Murakami's brutally surreal, utterly complete world creation. More to come.

I have never read a Murakami novel, and this has been recommended to me as his masterpiece. Seems like a good place to start....less

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Erika rated it:

(review of isbn 0679775439)

07/10/07

Read in July, 2007

The book jacket recommends The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle as "dreamlike and compelling" which I initially understood as cliche review talk. But several hundreds of pages in, I realized I really did felt compelled to read it, compelled during work, compelled on the subway, compelled during any free moment at home.

As a Chronicle, and a meta-aware one at that, part of the compulsion results from not knowing what the hell will happen next. In three "books", a chronological recor...more The book jacket recommends The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle as "dreamlike and compelling" which I initially understood as cliche review talk. But several hundreds of pages in, I realized I really did felt compelled to read it, compelled during work, compelled on the subway, compelled during any free moment at home.

As a Chronicle, and a meta-aware one at that, part of the compulsion results from not knowing what the hell will happen next. In three "books", a chronological recording of daily events slips into an out-of-order, out-of-narrator's-field-of-vision controlled orgy. The book moves, notoriously, from banal episodes of cooking pasta, searching for a lost cat and dull domestic chats to unsyncopated sliced plot randomness - anonymous sex-calls (desire), visits from Manchurian veterans (memory), the disappearance of the protagonist's wife and subsequent appearance of at least five memorable, distinct, bizarre characters - a "cheerfully morbid" teenaged girl, a set of sensual psychic sisters, and a mother-son team of healers, one of whom does not speak a word - to finally, battling mythical-real creations, dreamt lucidly in a haunted-comforting well (or are they?). The narrative tone remains tranquil, logical and sound throughout.

This sort of magical realism reminded me of Marquez, but the novel has a distinctly Japanese tone. Descriptions of environment (the cawing of the wind-up bird) underlines action and pivotal points reflect the imperialist (and defeated) political history unique to Japan, from the bombing of Nagasaki to the forgotten, crushing campaign in mainlain China and Mongolia against Soviet forces. What is the fate of a country? What is the fate of a man? What is the range of this book sitting placidly in your hand?

In this case, a likeable thirty year old Everyman (as he's been cast), one Toru Okado with an almost freakish amptitude for following strange requests from his wife, and his new compatriots, is just trying to find a little direction after quitting his lame paralegal job. Sometimes a person needs to slow down entirely to see where to go. I could be convinced of the Buddhist undertones of this notion, although I must say, I would really love to read a critical analysis which could contextualize and develop these piercing hints, dropped like so many breadcrumbs. I don't know, maybe Toru Okado should tell his story in a novel, etc.

Muraki develops memorable characters, to say the least. Though the book is written in first person (or maybe because of it), others' motivations are almost never fleshed out, are almost crap shoots in a dramatic, unseen fate. Everyone is imbued with a sense of mystery. The "dreamlike" component of the book plays out on the streets this way. I'm having a hard time articulating the strength of the characterization, especially when I must point out the similarities between some, purposely meshing into another, a most enchanting connection between the young man who does not speak and the narrator.

There were slow parts, but as in The Name of the Rose, these philosophic, or mostly in this case, historical digressions create a constellation of meaning. As the main character in the book, the reader is faced with piecing together disparate symbols for an underlying satisfying, if somewhat frustrating experience. I've read a few reviews after I turned the last page (still in a dreamline cogitation for closure) which criticize Murakami for dropping the ball at the end, for not fully "wrapping up" the loose ends, for even conning the reader. I think it presses us to find our own meaning, to be wrapped in the enigma of the everyday we are presented when we put the book down, when we return to the fiction of reality as we know it. ...less

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TheDane rated it:

04/10/08

Read in April, 2008

recommends it for: anyone smarter than a bag of hammers

Murakami's The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle is actually probably the best novel I've read in a long time. Granted, many of the novels I've read over the last two years have not been spectacular. There was The Lovely Bones. And then The Ass and the Angel. And then His Dark Materials. And o...more

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Yulia rated it:

(review of isbn 0679775439)

09/23/08

bookshelves: by-and-of-japan, constant-reader-books, read-to-me-by-frank

Read in September, 2008

From my comments on Constant Reader:

The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle was actually written while Murakami was a writer-in-residence at Harvard, where his translator also worked conveniently. According to an interview with Jay Rubin, as soon as Murakami would finish a section, he would give it to Rubin to translate and Rubin sometimes offered his own advice and critiques (he didn't care for the Kano sisters).

After finding out the book had been edited for the English edition, I went on a mini wil...more From my comments on Constant Reader:

The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle was actually written while Murakami was a writer-in-residence at Harvard, where his translator also worked conveniently. According to an interview with Jay Rubin, as soon as Murakami would finish a section, he would give it to Rubin to translate and Rubin sometimes offered his own advice and critiques (he didn't care for the Kano sisters).

After finding out the book had been edited for the English edition, I went on a mini wild sheep chase (short of learning Japanese and reading the original myself) to find out what passages or details had been censored. Perhaps a scene between Toru and May unfit for Americans? But after finding an interview with Jay Rubin, I learned that the answer is much less salacious: Rubin says it was merely a matter of redundant passages that he removed to tighten the text (Japanese writers rarely undergo the editing process that American publishers require), not an issue of specific content that was inappropriate.

It'll come as no surprise for those who have started this tome that Murakami writes without having laid out a plot first and just goes where his imagination takes him. This sometimes makes for frustrating passages, but it also leads his readers into literal and figurative terrains they wouldn't otherwise come across.

And ultimately, it's the quirky beauty of his details and similes that have always made him such a joy to read: for example, the utterly identifiable and senseless argument between Toru and his wife about blue tissues and patterned toilet paper, or the debate with May Kasahara about why six fingers is any less irrelevant than four breasts on a woman.

As I suggested in the regular CR thread, Murakami raises more questions than he answers in his books and often presents us with mysteries that simply can't be solved.

Another thing that struck me when I first read Wind-Up Bird was how May's parents and Toru weren't very surprised by her simply not going to school. But in a society where about 1% of students do just the same, stop attending classes; in a country that mastered the art of cram schools to prepare students for entrance exams into more challenging schools and high schoolers for entrance exams into better colleges, where admission to an elite college is meant to set you on the right track for getting a career; and where ruthless bullying is sanctioned by teachers and parents as part of the trials of coming-of-age, it becomes less surprising that some students simply opt out of the school system. It's become an increasing phenomenon, even an epidemic, in Japan, termed hikikomori, where kids and adults refuse to leave their room and are simply left food and/or an allowance by their helpless and sometimes abused parents (in Japan, domestic violence refers usually to kids beating their parents). Obviously, as she left her room and spoke easily with Toru, May wasn't a hikikomori, who are often male, but it did explain in part the seeming normalcy and comfort with her not going to school.

It occurred to me only a last week that perhaps it was Toru himself who best embodied the hikikomori mindset, not only in leaving his job, but in his long seclusion to and meditation at the bottom of the well. That made it more understandable, to me at least, why Murakami might have made his protagonist refuse to act for so long: however frustrating it was to read and endure with him, it may have been psychologically necessary for him to shut himself off from the world.

Another CR member made a good point about the cultural differences in our Western notion of being active and the Buddhist notion of flow. I do know Toru was actively processing events and listening to clues a he seems so passive. I suppose, as a wound-up East Coaster (a far East Coaster, as Palin would call me), I wanted Toru to spring to action when the wise or Zen thing to do was to wait, watch, and listen for the truth or the wave of motion to unfold. Perhaps we should regard and understand Toru as mindful above all else.
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Jason rated it:

08/23/08

Read in August, 2008

this book is VERY weird...

one thing that's occurred to me is the theme of the incertitude of accurate communication between human beings...
the telephone becomes a major symbol here...
at the time in which the novel is set, the early 80's, the telephone represented an insoluble mystery...
who is it we are really talking to when the telephone rings and we pick up the receiver?...
how do we know for certain they're who they say they are?...how do we know what they tell is accurate or true?...more

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Valerie rated it:

(review of isbn 0679775439)

08/13/08

Read in August, 2008

When I tried to write a review of this book, it came out sounding like this:

The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle is a beautifully written, complexly woven book that takes us into the life of Toru Okada, who quit his ordinary job and seems to be waiting to see where his life will take him next. However, a series of events occurs that turns his life upside-down, and although he continues to let events unfold around him, what develops thereafter is anything but ordinary.

Beautifully written? Co...more When I tried to write a review of this book, it came out sounding like this:

The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle is a beautifully written, complexly woven book that takes us into the life of Toru Okada, who quit his ordinary job and seems to be waiting to see where his life will take him next. However, a series of events occurs that turns his life upside-down, and although he continues to let events unfold around him, what develops thereafter is anything but ordinary.

Beautifully written? Complexly woven? Give me a break. I don't know why it was coming out like that. I mean: turns his life upside-down? If I came across this review, I'd be rolling my eyes.

But for some reason, I found this review to be very difficult to write. First, I can't summarize the story. It is beautiful, and it is complex, but I'm going to leave the explanation of the plot to the little GoodReads button that you can click up next to the book. I just don't have the hours that it would take in this instance for me personally to recreate that. It's just so long and involved that it's hard to condense.

I felt that reading the chronicle puts the reader in Toru's shoes, as many of the more surreal events force you to suspend disbelief and simply get carried along by the story. You have to be able to go with the flow to enjoy this book. Many colorful and eccentric characters are introduced, advancing the narrative with their own tales and adding a lot of subplots. It seems like it could become too much to keep track of, but each one was so well-crafted that they drew me in and kept me interested. I found many of the subplots (and secondary characters) to be far more interesting than Toru's own story.

My only complaint with this book is that I felt like it left many of those stories hanging or forgotten. I partially attribute this to the surreal nature of the book - I didn't really expect everything to be revealed - but also to the fact that it was simply too much to wrap up. At a certain point toward the end of the book, I found myself doing a lot of: but hey, whatever happened to so-and-so? And what about this part of the book that was so important at the time, but then just stopped being discussed? And what about...? The sum of all the parts of the books didn't completely add up for me.

But this is the kind of book that when you finish, you want to discuss it with someone, compare notes, and ask questions. I like it because not only did I enjoy reading it, but it also made me want to pursue those questions further. It's not necessarily a hard book to read, but it's definitely a lot to wrap your head around.

I'd give it three-and-a-half stars if I could, but I can't, so I'm going with: three....less

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Sam rated it:

05/22/08

recommended to Sam by: Thom Yorke.
recommends it for: People asleep, but the dream's ending. People coming out of the well.

Prior to reading this book I had fallen down in my regular reading. Where I was once reading at least one, but usually more books a week, I was reading a book maybe every 7 or 8 months and dreadfully slowly. Concurrent to the start of me reading this, I had just gone through a break up and things just generally felt like they were slowly beginning to come apart at the seams wherever I cast my gaze.

That's what I brought to the book. What the book brought to me was a similar experience to what...more Prior to reading this book I had fallen down in my regular reading. Where I was once reading at least one, but usually more books a week, I was reading a book maybe every 7 or 8 months and dreadfully slowly. Concurrent to the start of me reading this, I had just gone through a break up and things just generally felt like they were slowly beginning to come apart at the seams wherever I cast my gaze.

That's what I brought to the book. What the book brought to me was a similar experience to what I was feeling on an emotional level, and a process by which I could enjoy getting lost in a book again, and a return to not just thinking about things, but thinking about what lay under the surface of things.

I know, I know. How fucking pretentious and twee can you get.

To start on a plot description in my review would be a waste of everyone's time. There's some excellent reviews already here on the site and some of them tackle the nuts and bolts a hell of a lot better than I could. Especially since this is a book with a wonderfully quicksand like concoction of a plot.

I want to make special note of the way Murakami is an expert at listing the mundane normal activities of daily life. In all of his books, there's at least one scene of a character making some kind of rudimentary meal, having a cup of coffee or a bottle of beer, and then relaxing while listening to either old jazz records or a Beatle's album. It should come off as boring, especially in a book about people with special healing powers and dream prostitutes and exotic torture sequences in World War II, but it never is. It just blends into the fabric of Murakami's simple but lovely oneiric writing.

The book continues another masterful trend in Murakami's books that I've always loved in that, on one level, it's a very slow, patient book that does have something of a plot, but it's all over the place with a passive narrator who slowly makes his way through it, making it easier and comfortable for the reader to venture along with him (even when he's not the most excited or active of protagonists). But then there's a deeper level, what I would almost say is a kind of second novel hidden within, written in tone and emotional resonance and really composed just for your subconscious to pick up on.

In a lot of ways, I feel that I can't write a normal review for the book, or that it's hard with Murakami's dream novels. Obiviously, they're just novels, intellectual constructs to breeze through and enjoy, but they're like walking through a person's brain and reminisces, navigating through their desires and their wounds, admiring their weird little ephemera all around you. Reading this novel, for me, was much like several of the character's paths in the book: They went into a place that was strange and new, both scary and amazing, and they found something and brought it out with them. In the sunlight, while examining it, they realized that something was their's....less

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Toddhuish rated it:

07/09/08

Read in July, 2008

recommends it for: Anyone wanting to try something different

This book was bizarre in the extreme. I have never read a Murakami book before but from what I can gather, they're all a little weird. The story is frequently inexplicable and the plot non-existent. It's a very strange jumble of barely to not at all connected stories thrown together into a novel.

Up to this point it may sound like I didn't like it. To be honest, I can't say I liked it but I can't say I disliked it either. There were some parts that I loved! That's why I gave it 3 star...more This book was bizarre in the extreme. I have never read a Murakami book before but from what I can gather, they're all a little weird. The story is frequently inexplicable and the plot non-existent. It's a very strange jumble of barely to not at all connected stories thrown together into a novel.

Up to this point it may sound like I didn't like it. To be honest, I can't say I liked it but I can't say I disliked it either. There were some parts that I loved! That's why I gave it 3 stars. Reading this book is a bit of a roller-coaster because, although I didn't understand what was happening for large stretches of the book, I really enjoy how he wrote this insane mishmash of a book.

I don't know what this is like in original Japanese. I don't know if it sounds weird because it's translated. He doesn't have a voice like anyone else. The words are lyrical and dense and carry a weight and a meaning that had me going page to page when I would have given up on other books long ago. His descriptions of people and places are amazing and put you right there in the book with the characters.

I'll show you what I mean. This isn't the best paragraph, it was just the first one that came to mind when I think of his writing style

=============================================
He was somewhat shorter than I. The hint of a smile played about his lips, as if he had just heard a joke and was smiling now in the most natural way. Nor had the joke been a vulgar one: it was the kind of elegant pleasantry that the minister of foreign affairs might have told the crown prince at a garden party a generation ago, causing the surrounding listeners to titter with delight. I began to introduce myself, but he gave his head a slight shake to signal that it was unnecessary for me to say anything. Holding the door open inward, he ushered me in, and after a quick glance up and down the hall, he closed the door, saying nothing all the while. He looked at me with eyes narrowed as if to apologize for being unable to speak because of the nervous black panther sleeping by his side. Which is not to say that there was a black panther sleeping by his side: he just looked as if there were.
=============================================

That is a single paragraph out of a 600 page novel and they are, more or less, all like that. The description of the character looking with narrowed eyes because of a nervous black panther is easily the weirdest description of a look I've ever read but at the same time you know exactly what that look must look like.

This book is like a complex, arthouse movie. Some books, just like some movies, you only recommend to your most open minded lovers of fine books. The ones who will like something experimental merely because it is experimental. The ones who will like something for a single, very special, aspect and don't need a lot of extra frippery like a plot or storyline that, you know, makes sense. This is a book to recommend to those people.
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Dave rated it:

(review of isbn 0679775439)

09/18/07

Read in September, 2007

So before long, you find yourself 340 pages into this book, and you have no idea what's happening.. Rather, you understand all you have read to this point, but still can't determine the direction Murakami is taking you in.

Still, the book is compelling. You can't seem to put it down. Meanwhile it begins to invade your dreams.. in much the same manner that Toru's (the main character) dreams are invaded. You start having dreams about strange women and empty wells.

So cracking into &qu...more

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tadpole rated it:

08/23/08

bookshelves: 1001, 2008, cpl

Read in August, 2008

Throughout reading this book, I kept coming back to an idea that I have been toying with for awhile. Please note that the experimental group here consists mainly of my wife and myself and a few random observations, so massive sampling error may be afoot. I'm also sure that I am not the originator of this line of thought, but I have not encountered it elsewhere as of yet.

***Warning! Broad, sweeping generalizations after the jump***

When it comes to literature and movies, males tend to grav...more Throughout reading this book, I kept coming back to an idea that I have been toying with for awhile. Please note that the experimental group here consists mainly of my wife and myself and a few random observations, so massive sampling error may be afoot. I'm also sure that I am not the originator of this line of thought, but I have not encountered it elsewhere as of yet.

***Warning! Broad, sweeping generalizations after the jump***

When it comes to literature and movies, males tend to gravitate more towards physical activity. This is a world where faces get punched, caps are popped into asses, and folks get their freak on. Action verbs are being committed on a massive scale, and the world is a fundamentally different place after the fact. I've taken to calling this the macrocosm of human interaction.

Females, on the other hand, tend to be drawn more towards emotional activity. This is a world of intimate social interactions between individuals that may not always explicitly occur at the verbal level. The world is still fundamentally changed afterwards, but usually in a much more subtle way. Cultural arbiters have even been kind enough to gift us with the "Chick" prefix when the situation presented revolves heavily around romantic issues or therapy through excessive shopping. I refer to this as the microcosm of human interaction.

Once again, I realize that this does not apply to every male and female across the board. I also realize that most great works of art incorporate both of these to some extent.

So what the heck does all of this have to do with 'The Wind-up Bird Chronicle'?

I believe that Murakami is dealing here with the microcosm almost exclusively. Having said that, I am really drawn to it at some level. The story is very vast, as the book spans over 600 pages. A very basic plot synopsis without spoilers would be that Toru Okada is going through some massive changes in his life. These changes may have to do with emerging psychic type powers. If this is the case, he will have to master these new abilities in order to bring about positive change in the lives of those around him. That description was so generic that it sucked the life out of the book and made it sound incredibly boring, but I assure you that is not the case.

A problem that I was having with this book and also the previous Murakami book that I read ('After Dark') is that not all questions are answered by the end of the book. However, I am now starting to come to peace with this. After all, that's how the microcosm often is in real life. Quoting my Goodreads buddy Tami, "It's the journey."
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Gana rated it:

10/11/07

Read in January, 2006

I guess, full understanding of this book is a hard task for the most of readers. But seems it makes book even more entertaining. Murakami entertains his readers exposing a world of subconsciousness, which is managed by an invisible hand - an invisible energy that we generate. In the book, many characters are subconsciously connected to each other and take actions subconsciously. I guess, it is the reason why Murakami left them unexplained, leaving many readers unsatisfied.

The main plot of t...more I guess, full understanding of this book is a hard task for the most of readers. But seems it makes book even more entertaining. Murakami entertains his readers exposing a world of subconsciousness, which is managed by an invisible hand - an invisible energy that we generate. In the book, many characters are subconsciously connected to each other and take actions subconsciously. I guess, it is the reason why Murakami left them unexplained, leaving many readers unsatisfied.

The main plot of the book is the resentment between two individualists with good and evil morals: Toru Okada and Naboru Wataya (or likewise Lieutenant Mamyia and Boris Manskinner). Other characters and plots are supportive. The main purpose of Corporal Honda sending empty box to Toru Okada through Lieutenant Mamyia was to connect these two people in similar situation, psychologically fighting with evil. By connecting them, Corporal Honda helps Lieutenant Mamyia relieve his long time suffering, letting him to open his secrets to Toru Okada. It adds Toru's hatred to Naboru Wataya and gives strength to defeat him. From the book I sense Toru Okada is a Lieutenant Mamaya, living in different time. He is similar to the reincarnation of Mamiya (or other people who suffered in WWII), takes actions, to fulfill Mamyia's dream: defeating evil like people and being loved by someone or having sex with woman (Creta Kano) in both real and dreamlike world. This book tells that evil and poisonous people, like Naboru Wataya always exist and succeed far. They exist in the context of different situations and the impact of their negative, powerful energy is fatal. Book gives impression that Murakami explodes his own personal hatred to evil like people and dislike to the dominant social psychology (people's confusion) through his book. I feel like I see Murakami in different characters of his book.

Appearance of teenager girl, May Kasahara makes Toru Okada's character clearer. She is strong and bright individual and helps Toru to shape his own view. Murakami perfectly exposes deeper feelings of different people, in the context of different circumstances.

Story about Mongolian man who skins people is shocking, because I'm Mongolian and I never heard this kind of things happened during WWII. I'm not really sure whether it is based in historical fact or it is fiction. Anyway, this did not affect at all my feelings towards Murakami and his books. He is great.

Even though the book was excellent, I have to admit that, in most of cases I fell asleep while reading. But it does not mean that the book was bad; may be I felt the same way as Toru Okada was feeling while sitting in the well....less

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christa rated it:

09/21/08

Read in September, 2008

… And with that, my top five books of all time has to be reconfigured to make room for Haruki Murakami’s The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle.

This novel starts with the disappearance of a cat that belongs to the unemployed, wandering, passive and nondescript main character Toru Okada and his premenstral wife Kumiko. Eventually Kumiko follows the cat’s lead, leaving for work one morning and never coming home.

While trying to make sense of what is going on around him — and how it all ties int...more … And with that, my top five books of all time has to be reconfigured to make room for Haruki Murakami’s The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle.

This novel starts with the disappearance of a cat that belongs to the unemployed, wandering, passive and nondescript main character Toru Okada and his premenstral wife Kumiko. Eventually Kumiko follows the cat’s lead, leaving for work one morning and never coming home.

While trying to make sense of what is going on around him — and how it all ties into Kumiko’s hollow politician brother Noboru Wataya – Toru Okada encounters a handful of quirky women who take him from Point A to Point B, via Point R, X and Z: May Kasahara, a teenaged neighbor girl who chain smokes and is interested in male-pattern baldness and death; Malta Kano, a sort of mystic in a red vinyl hat who is enlisted by Kumiko to help find the cat; Creta Kano, Malta’s sister, who appears in Toru Okada’s dreams and seduces him — only to physically run into him later and say things like: Hey! How about that dream! And Nutmeg Akasaka, who harnesses Toru Okada’s otherworldly powers — which come to him in the form of a blue mark on his cheek, acquired after sitting at the bottom of a dry well for a few days — and takes on the role of a sort of madam.

It’s all very complicated. And you are forced to check your disbelief at the door because any jam the main character encounters will be fixed with who-do voodoo.

The physical aspect of reading this book, alone, is intense. Within the first few chapters I fell asleep after reading and had a dream that was narrated by Toru Okada in a sort of slow, soothing, whisper — exactly what reading these words feels like. There are chapters that include torture scenes from World War II that are so vivid and so violent, my legs went numb. In one, a side character watches a man be skinned alive. “It truly was like skinning a peach.” In another, a handful of men are stabbed with bayonets, the process of doing it described in great detail that is essentially: stab, stir and repeat.

Mostly, reading this book feels like leaving the house early on a Sunday morning for a long walk to nowhere in particular. Veering off to kick a pile of leaves, grabbing a cup of coffee from a cafe, stumbling into an alley and staring at a garage door for an hour. Falling asleep on a park bench and waking up unsure of the surroundings. Spinning a circle with your eyes closed, then trying to walk home.

In a good way.

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Fred rated it:

09/17/08

Read in September, 2008

This was the second Murakami book I read, the first being Kafka on the Shore. I enjoyed in both of them the deliberate, controlled language, the deep and layered mysteries driving the story, and the historical background that informed part of the narrative (much more so in this one). I think Murakami creates some very compelling images and has a particular talent for creating an atmosphere of strangeness as viewed by protagonists that seem quite normal (normal to the point of being being more de...more This was the second Murakami book I read, the first being Kafka on the Shore. I enjoyed in both of them the deliberate, controlled language, the deep and layered mysteries driving the story, and the historical background that informed part of the narrative (much more so in this one). I think Murakami creates some very compelling images and has a particular talent for creating an atmosphere of strangeness as viewed by protagonists that seem quite normal (normal to the point of being being more detatched that the more extreme characters around them).

This is all mere description, I realize, and that's in part because one needs to know what exactly there is to enjoy in being presented mysteries without getting the satisfaction of solutions. It can be a frustrating experience, but of course so can being given unsatisfying answers merely to satisfy the compact between author and reader that "all will be revealed in the end." Some things fall into place, or at least become less murky. Other things are left to their own strange, cockeyed logic, and one has to accept that. After all, if one is to get a glimpse into a world truly not one's own, the view does not come with a guidebook and a friendly ambassador. Otherwise you might as well be taking a bus trip of a foreign country. In the end, those who people the underworlds of Murakami's vision are *not* just like us. They can't be, and thus we can't expect to know exactly why things are as they are there.

That said, this book deserves the highest possible marks, but I have withheld that for two reasons. One, the mysteries in The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle are so complete that even the half-explanations one should accept seem less than fair at times. Very late in the book, it seems the mysteries are only deepening, and it can become tiring over the course of a long novel to be given so few clues. Second, however, is the fact that the book in the third part begins to feel like its become overlong. So much time is spent in the early part of the book creating the strange atmosphere and following the often mundane daily tasks of the protagonist that the story felt like it was losing momentum even as some of the most interesting and important parts were being revealed. While the first two hundred pages pulled me along almost without my noticing, the last two hundred presented a challenge that I had to settle down to and sprint my way through.

All in all, I will remember this book for a long time to come, and I will no doubt go on to read more of Murakami's books. But they don't seem to be the kind of novels one can read one after the other. So far I'm working in one a year, and that seems the right pace....less

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Debbie rated it:

09/26/08

Read in September, 2008

I’ve tried reading Murakami books for about five years now, and I’ve never been able to get past a couple of pages. Probably it’s because I’ve always gravitated to realism, but with the passing of David Foster Wallace and his rant against the realists domination, maybe I gave abstract writing more of shot than I normally would have.

I picked up the thickest Murakami book I could find, his “Windup Bird Chronicles,” and patiently eased my way in. As with my other tries, I had a har...more I’ve tried reading Murakami books for about five years now, and I’ve never been able to get past a couple of pages. Probably it’s because I’ve always gravitated to realism, but with the passing of David Foster Wallace and his rant against the realists domination, maybe I gave abstract writing more of shot than I normally would have.

I picked up the thickest Murakami book I could find, his “Windup Bird Chronicles,” and patiently eased my way in. As with my other tries, I had a hard time with the tedious descriptions of things that I considered mundane and the dialogue between the main character and his wife struck me as flat. But I think I kept going because I liked reading about someone unemployed. That feeling of disconnectedness, which comes with having an abundance of time and no schedule, is no stranger to me, and from time to time I pine for this again.

Half way through the book, when the weirdness started to take off, I realized what the prosaic details were all about. Of course, that contrast allows the reader to connect to this guy and makes the strangeness all that more real. It’s Alfred Hitchcock’s cardinal rule, real horror comes from submerging ordinary people in extraordinary circumstances.

All of the women in the story have been tortured in some way. These females are drawn to the male main character and float around him through the book, but he never shakes that foothold into his lackluster world, even when rage wells up in him and overcomes his cool character. While he traverses the metaphysical world, his dreams, goals and reasoning don’t travel beyond his terrestrial existence.

Most of the twists and turns are neatly connected, but questions do remain, like why was the fashion designer’s husband brutally murdered? How exactly was Noboru Wataya controlling his sisters? It was somehow sexual, but without involving sexual relations. What was the deal with the guy with the baseball bat? The bat itself seemed more important that the black-frame glasses guy. I kinda didn’t get why so much time was spent on the WWII stories; they were interesting, but I’m still not sure what they had to do with the other storylines.

I feel like I got overwhelmed somewhere in the depths of that primitive computer (I pictured it as a Tandy, by the way), and maybe some more explanations lie in the other chronicles the reader nor the protagonist didn't see. It’s easy to forgive Murakami, though, because even though the book isn't all tied up in the end, the journey to get there had me in its grip. ...less

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Jaci rated it:

(review of isbn 0679775439)

02/01/08

Read in January, 2008

recommends it for: anyone who wants to read a mind-blowing, deep novel

Spoiler Alert:

This book blew my mind. Murakami has a wonderful way of taking regular people in mundane lives and bringing them to live with surreal events. He took such a simple concept and turned it into an intricate web: we cannot escape our past, and we cannot get the most out of our present or future until we are willing to confront our

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