Book Review: Kafka on the Shore, by Haruki Murakami

An old man who talks to cats vs. a whiskey-drinking cat-killer named Johnny Walker, and a teenager named Kafka who runs away to live in a library and talks to a voice in his head named Crow. WTF, it's Haruki Murakami.

Originally published (in Japanese) in 2002. English translation published 2005. 656 pages

Kafka on the Shore follows the fortunes of two remarkable characters. Kafka Tamura runs away from home at 15, under the shadow of his father's dark prophesy. The aging Nakata, tracker of lost cats, who never recovered from a bizarre childhood affliction, finds his pleasantly simplified life suddenly turned upside down. Their parallel odysseys are enriched throughout by vivid accomplices and mesmerising dramas. Cats converse with people; fish tumble from the sky; a ghostlike pimp deploys a Hegel-spouting girl of the night; a forest harbours soldiers apparently un-aged since WWII. There is a savage killing, but the identity of both victim and killer is a riddle.

Murakami's new novel is at once a classic tale of quest, but it is also a bold exploration of mythic and contemporary taboos, of patricide, of mother-love, of sister-love. Above all it is an entertainment of a very high order.

( Magical realism: it's all about the penis. )

Verdict: Fantasy by any other name, but a peculiar surrealistic fantasy blending dreams and parallel worlds with modern Japan. The magic is all unexplained plot devices while the characters are the center of the story. Haruki Murakami is like sushi, an acquired taste that some love and others will never stop gagging over. This was not my favorite Murakami novel, but it was still entertaining and interesting and weird in a good but uncomfortable way. But he also kind of reminds me of Piers Anthony, if Piers Anthony could write and actually had meaningful and interesting things to say: the line between "fun and magical story" and "perverse" can disappear in a hurry.

Also by Haruki Murakami: My reviews of Norwegian Wood and The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle.

Book Review: Kafka on the Shore, by Haruki Murakami

An old man who talks to cats vs. a whiskey-drinking cat-killer named Johnny Walker, and a teenager named Kafka who runs away to live in a library and talks to a voice in his head named Crow. WTF, it's Haruki Murakami.

Originally published (in Japanese) in 2002. English translation published 2005. 656 pages

Kafka on the Shore follows the fortunes of two remarkable characters. Kafka Tamura runs away from home at 15, under the shadow of his father's dark prophesy. The aging Nakata, tracker of lost cats, who never recovered from a bizarre childhood affliction, finds his pleasantly simplified life suddenly turned upside down. Their parallel odysseys are enriched throughout by vivid accomplices and mesmerising dramas. Cats converse with people; fish tumble from the sky; a ghostlike pimp deploys a Hegel-spouting girl of the night; a forest harbours soldiers apparently un-aged since WWII. There is a savage killing, but the identity of both victim and killer is a riddle.

Murakami's new novel is at once a classic tale of quest, but it is also a bold exploration of mythic and contemporary taboos, of patricide, of mother-love, of sister-love. Above all it is an entertainment of a very high order.

( Magical realism: it's all about the penis. )

Verdict: Fantasy by any other name, but a peculiar surrealistic fantasy blending dreams and parallel worlds with modern Japan. The magic is all unexplained plot devices while the characters are the center of the story. Haruki Murakami is like sushi, an acquired taste that some love and others will never stop gagging over. This was not my favorite Murakami novel, but it was still entertaining and interesting and weird in a good but uncomfortable way. But he also kind of reminds me of Piers Anthony, if Piers Anthony could write and actually had meaningful and interesting things to say: the line between "fun and magical story" and "perverse" can disappear in a hurry.

Also by Haruki Murakami: My reviews of Norwegian Wood and The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle.