The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle

I have been avoiding Murakami for the past 6-7 years now, ever since I noticed it becoming so prominently featured in American bookstores for that simple fact alone.  Having finally read one now, I can honestly say that the decision I had been making was a stupid one.

It has been a very long time since I have been so engaged in a book.  I felt sincerely sorry as the pages in my right hand grew fewer in number, but yet propelled to continue further and to let the story continue.  Simply speaking, I loved the experience I had with this book.  So much so, that although I have other books to start ready to go, I may just go to the book store and buy more Murakami novels in order to feed this new passion that has been lit within me.

The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle is surreal in a way that stands out from other stories that might be compared to it.  Murakami is able to manipulate emotion in a way that I have rarely experienced before in reading: there are parts that are incredibly graphic and grotesque, yet simultaneously warmly enveloping.  In the same way, there are other parts that are beautifully poetic yet cause an emotional discomfort that is hard to describe.

Almost all of Murakami's characters are chatty.  This is another unusual way in which the author builds the novel.  We learn the stories of each character from their own words, simply because they all tend to overshare while getting to the point of something completely off-topic.  As far as I'm concerned, I have never experienced a writing style like this before, and as a writer who struggles with dialogue, I admire it.

My only regret is that the story did not end with a clear wrap-up of the countless number of loose threads presented throughout the book.  In the end, Murakami chose not to approach reason, but somehow it did not offend me in the way that other books do when they leave plot holes unfilled. Like the tentacles of the jellyfish that Toru Okada so feared, all of the questions I had built up remained gently swaying in the dark with ominous mystery.  Somehow, though, it just worked.

Detour: Of Things Gone Astray

I went to the bookstore yesterday with the intent of buying some books from the list, but having only been able to find 2 of the 3 I was seeking, I picked up a new book which I honestly just chose based on looks.

Of Things Gone Astray by Janina Matthewson, in a very one-dimensional view, is written in a generically "new fiction" way that is so common now in artsy hipster-indie fiction.  "Strangers" simultaneously have a traumatic experience happen to them, and their stories become interwoven without their directly knowing it.  It has that very attractive, melancholy tone that I am drawn to, that lends itself to fantasy similar to The Boy Detective Fails by Joe Meno.

The beginning of the book, though enjoyable, honestly did not find me very impressed.  It felt familiarly sugary to me in a way that reminded me of my own writing.  As the story progressed however, certain moments of sweetness and creativity revealed themselves in rather impressive (for lack of a better term) ways.  It is a quiet, emotional book with extremely likable characters.

Personally, it was a good weekend to be reminded that things get lost and found all the time, but life keeps going on.  You must keep living it, you know?

The Brothers Karamazov

It felt like an irrationally long time that it took me to read this book, but having gone back and seen my last post, I see it has only been the duration of 3 months.  Long, yes, but not the eternity it seemed.

I have read Dostoevsky before, albeit in high school, and in comparison, this one felt so much more humorous and playful.  Of course, it may just be that the in my youth I was too inexperienced with literature (not to mention so emo) to understand the subtleties of the writer's wordsmithing, or it may even have been the fault of whatever translator's rendition of Crime and Punishment that I experienced, but the cold and harsh story that I remember in that case is something of a completely different world compared to this edition of The Brothers.  It is important to note here, that this copy in question was translated by Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky whom I have raved about before.

In short, I found it delightful that there could be so much "fun" in a russian murder mystery (for lack of a better term).  It felt a bit like self-deprecation of Dostoevsky's own genre, while also challenging so much of what would be commonplace like religion and devotion (in all respects).  And oh, the drama.  If only we could be so outwardly passionate and yet fickle in our daily lives and fall into fits as often, maybe we would all be a little less uptight.

I must say, I could have done with the speeches being cut to a third of what they were though.  I know, I know, it's Russian literature.  I stand my ground.  Especially when there wasn't a single mention of snow in 776 pages.