A Wild Sheep Chase
by Haruki MurakamiSign in to Goodreads to see your friends' reviews of this book.
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Read in March, 2008
recommends it for:
people who want a rather light read that can develop into something deeper
A Wild Sheep Chase was the third book that I have read by Murakami. I found out after I finished that it is that third book in "The Trilogy of the Rat". The first two books in this series are now out of print, but after reading A Wild Sheep Chase, I think I have to chase down some used copies of the novels and experience the trilogy in full.
I interpreted the novel to be a story of emotion journey more than a story of physical journey. There was an actual journey involved as the m...more
I interpreted the novel to be a story of emotion journey more than a story of physical journey. There was an actual journey involved as the m...more
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Read in September, 2007
recommends it for:
Fans of the impossible and the fantastic.
When one is approached by a random person and asked to locate a life form that is physically unable to exist, but which you have a picture of, and you choose to do it because you have to, you know you're in for something fantastical. Part noir thriller, part philosophical daydream, the wild sheep chase moves effortlessly along (partially due to the brilliant translation), and scene by scene we are more and more drawn into the story of soon to be thirty year old J. Philosophical detours into en...more
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I am a fan of this author. I enjoy reading his novels while moving around: on the subway, in an airplane, amongst distractions. Murakami verges on being little more than an indie rock version of a standard thriller/suspense writer—producing the literary equivalent of films like “Donnie Darko.” Apparently, I even read and enjoyed the sequel to this book (“Dance Dance Dance”), without realizing that I had a sequel in my hands. This all leads up to me admitting that “The Wild Sheep Chas...more
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Read in August, 2007
Not quite as immediately engaging as the last Murakami I read (The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle), in some ways this book seems like a dry run for that book—mysterious symbolic animal at the center of the story, a disolving marriage, eccentric rich people appearing out of nowhere to move the plot forward, whole chapters devoted to the past histories of otherwise unimportant characters, chapters written in the form of letters, etc... I haven't read enough Murakami to know whether all his books ...more
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Read in January, 2008
recommended to Herrikias by:
Sonjarecommends it for: Animist anticapitalists
This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here.
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Read in June, 2008
The prequel to Haruki Murakami's Dance Dance Dance, A Wild Sheep Chase is actually the third in a series. The first two novels in the so-called Trilogy of the Rat haven't yet been published by an American press, even though they're 20+ years old. (Seriously, someone get the US rights for Pinball 1973 and ...more
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Read in October, 2007
recommends it for:
Sheep People
A few thoughts on Murakami's use of simile:
On one hand, Murakami’s prose moves along so quickly that, on occasion, he drops the less-than-necessary parts of a sentence. He hits you with this from the outset of the novel: "Nothing special. Something a rookie reporter fresh out of college might've written for practice." These are the third and fourth sentences, respectively. The writing is fast, journalistic. This applies until Murakami really describes something, usually using...more
On one hand, Murakami’s prose moves along so quickly that, on occasion, he drops the less-than-necessary parts of a sentence. He hits you with this from the outset of the novel: "Nothing special. Something a rookie reporter fresh out of college might've written for practice." These are the third and fourth sentences, respectively. The writing is fast, journalistic. This applies until Murakami really describes something, usually using...more
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Read in June, 2008
Okay. I think it’s time I take a break from reading Murakami. A Wild Sheep Chase is the third book by Murakami I’ve read in the last couple months and I’ve come to the conclusion that there are a few things that can be said about Murakami and his work:
1. Women are mysterious creatures. They come. They go. And rarely does their purpose go beyond sex. I’m getting kind of tired of reading the sentence: “Then I found myself thinking about sex with her.” Big surprise!
2. Murakami...more
1. Women are mysterious creatures. They come. They go. And rarely does their purpose go beyond sex. I’m getting kind of tired of reading the sentence: “Then I found myself thinking about sex with her.” Big surprise!
2. Murakami...more
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Read in July, 2008
Here's what I loved about this book. It praises with out applauding the fault of human kind which is of course our humanness, maybe our weakness, but possibly also our strength. There are many thoughts still floating around in my brain, I just can't put them into language. Maybe there is a sheep in me. Just kidding.
This book really was a wild chase. I've heard of people who read the ends of books so that they can take their time reading the body of it, not rushing to find out how it end...more
This book really was a wild chase. I've heard of people who read the ends of books so that they can take their time reading the body of it, not rushing to find out how it end...more
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Murakami, even thought he's super famous, is someone I wouldn't read if I read the plots. They sound on the surface too new agey for me. But the fact is he is an incredible craft-style writer that makes you want to turn the page faster and faster. I rarely met a person who doesn't at the very least enjoy his books.
"A Wild Sheep Chase" is one of the first for him to go into a sort of fantasy world - but still based on the world that we know. There's Tokyo but it could be almost...more
"A Wild Sheep Chase" is one of the first for him to go into a sort of fantasy world - but still based on the world that we know. There's Tokyo but it could be almost...more
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Read in November, 2007
The latest Murakami I read was also my first: The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle, given to me by Nina for my fifteenth birthday. It is widely considered as the "poster boy" book for Murakami, with the inconspicuous and jaded narrator and his wild search for something even he cannot understand, and all the strange and fantastic elements and characters he meets along the way.
And though a lot of themes and small details from Wind-Up Bird reappeared in Sheep Chase, I think...more
And though a lot of themes and small details from Wind-Up Bird reappeared in Sheep Chase, I think...more
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Read in January, 2002
This was my first Murakami experience and I don't know if I was adequately prepared for what to expect. In 2002, a guy I was briefly seeing raved about Murakami and gave this book to me with the highest recommendation but, just as our relationship quickly fizzled, so did this book. However much I liked the novel's first half, the aimless and other-worldy ending turned me off Murakami until 2005, when I had to cancel a trip to Japan the day before my flight and ended up going to the hospital an...more
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Read in July, 2007
recommends it for:
Fans of great magical realism
I don't know what it is about magical realism that seems most appropriate to a foreign setting. Is it the different-ness of foreign places that allows us to believe that magic hides behind everyday lives, and only a few stumble upon it, or is it the straightforward, bootstraps-hard work-money-success nature of America that precludes it? Either way, this story is a great introduction to Murakami. The story is so interesting and compelling that some of the quirks are barely noticeable. For exa...more
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Has a copy to sell/swap
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Read in August, 2008
Under the everyday and the normal there exists another world where existence is not bound by anything. Alone and mediocre, as every human being is, one has to simply detach themselves from normal reality to get a glimpse of true meaning of things. Reading Murakami's books, I always get the feeling that the main character is in fact himself. From one story to the next he remains virtually unchanged in his interactions and thoughts. Like an observer that gets swept with the flow of the river, esse...more
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Read in April, 2008
Reading A Wild Sheep Chase reminded me a whole lot of A Catcher in the Rye since it was written in first person, but more than that, the main character resembled Holden a whole lot in both habit and thought. They felt the same changes in atmosphere and lived a life that wasn't exactly you'd call productive.
Undoubtedly, it was written in a way readers ought to like. It wasn't hard to read, meaning, most people wouldn't find themselves forcing to turn the page just to finish the novel.
It ...more
Undoubtedly, it was written in a way readers ought to like. It wasn't hard to read, meaning, most people wouldn't find themselves forcing to turn the page just to finish the novel.
It ...more
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Read in July, 2007
recommends it for:
anyone who's already read Murakami
This book, as others have said, was slow to pick up. Many elements are familiar, seeminly standard washed out Murakami male lead looking lacking meaning. Initially a complete lack of identifiable female characters with ummmm...character...a sense of nhilistic freedom.
Also as others have said, it picks up a great deal around the half way mark, once the character gets on the quest. The sketching of Hokkaido makde me want to go there, as Pat said, the environment, the atmosphere of the book are...more
Also as others have said, it picks up a great deal around the half way mark, once the character gets on the quest. The sketching of Hokkaido makde me want to go there, as Pat said, the environment, the atmosphere of the book are...more
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Read in August, 2005
recommends it for:
anyone with a pulse
I read this book after being medically evacuated to Singapore, while locked up for a two-day recovery in a French hotel. I couldn't walk very much at the time but was grateful to have an excuse to dwell in the realm of this book without respite.
For me, it is Murakami's best, a lucid dream strung together with some of the most beautiful phrases in literature. At the risk of sounding pathetically infatuated, it made me happy to be alive; it gave me the hope I often lack about the potential fo...more
For me, it is Murakami's best, a lucid dream strung together with some of the most beautiful phrases in literature. At the risk of sounding pathetically infatuated, it made me happy to be alive; it gave me the hope I often lack about the potential fo...more
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Read in January, 2005
I’d read a great review of Murakami’s latest, Kafka on the Shore. Because I have a thing about reading hardcovers, I had to wait for the paperback version. To prepare myself for the oddness of Kafka on the Shore, I picked up Murakami’s first novel, a crazy story about a man searching for a sheep with a star on its back that ends up being this mystical/metaphysical entity. I think the prose is a strange hybrid of Vonnegut and Dom Delillo – a straightforward, energetic and conversationa...more
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Has a copy to sell/swap
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Read in May, 2008
I wasn't all that impressed with this book. I love Murakami and have read three other books by him. The ideas in this book are good and some of them kept me thinking and even inspired me to write about them, but the themes took over the book and the plot and characters suffered. I found myself only finishing it in hopes that somehow I would end up being impressed by it, as I was with the Wind Up Bird Chronicle. Whta I did really like about it and this can be said of all his writing is that the s...more
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Read in May, 2008
recommends it for:
other artists, writers, dreamers, & fans of detective novels
...morning, tea, and Murakami.
our lead character comes upon at a friend's house in the mountains.
the friend isn't home;hasn't been there in at least a week.
but the key's in the mailbox, and entrance is gained.
after falling asleep, he wakes and has coffee, only to find that his girlfriend who he came with, has since disappeared.
snow is threatening...
he finds an old vacuum-tube type stereo from the 60's and
puts on a Nat King Cole record & begins to play solitare...and to think ab...more
our lead character comes upon at a friend's house in the mountains.
the friend isn't home;hasn't been there in at least a week.
but the key's in the mailbox, and entrance is gained.
after falling asleep, he wakes and has coffee, only to find that his girlfriend who he came with, has since disappeared.
snow is threatening...
he finds an old vacuum-tube type stereo from the 60's and
puts on a Nat King Cole record & begins to play solitare...and to think ab...more
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