First Impressions

The book began in a really slow pace, The author Haruki Murakami took time to carefully reveal our main character Toru Okada. Right in the beginning we are put amid mass confusion, Toru who had quit his job and is now working as the housewife receives a phone call from a strange woman while hes cooking lunch. The woman asks only for 10 minutes to talk and to get to know him(later on in the book she again asks for only 10 minutes) . This mysterious begins talking and asking him questions and later on reveals that she was naked, basically she was having phone sex. It was quite an interesting start we meet a strange/mysterious character who knows Toru, but Toru himself doesnt know her. Toru Okada is in search for his lost cat and this is where the mysterious adventure begins. A series of events leads to him receiving a phone call from his wife Kumiko who apparently knows a random woman who can tell where the cat was, which I found completely weird. His wife asks him to go to a dark alley to find the cat(who would usually be there), but Toru is confused to why Kumiko had been to the alley as it takes a lot of effort to get there. This is when we are introduced to a 16 year old girl named May Kasahara,  shes one of the strange characters in this book, I found her a bit too talkative and mature for her age, but anyways she becomes really friendly with Toru and gives a helping hand in search for Torus' cat. For some reason I find May uncanny in some sense because shes been faking an "injury" so that she doesnt have to go to school and It was really strange of her to become so close to a man a lot older than her. Anyways the book is not short on strange characters, ever since the disappearance of the cat everything has suddenly been throw in a disarray. As from the previous comments his wife is so attached to this cat she hires a woman, Malta Kano who claims can help them find their cat. In return for Malta Kanos help, Toru needs to help in convicting Kumikos brother who raped Maltas sister. So far I noticed there were a lot of coincidences and they were bound to meet each other.

From here on wards the story just spirals into becoming more weird and more supernatural. Toru meets several other strange characters during his search for the cat, one of them is Creta Kano, who is Malta Kanos' sister. She is not what she seems, as she used to be a real life prostitute. She comes over to Torus' house to collect a sample of water, which I am still confused to why she did so and how does that relate to helping him with the cat. Anyway our main character starts having wet dreams about Creta Kano, but he has no emotion towards Creta at all. Later on we meet a veteran of war who tells a horrific story of his time in World War II which was somewhat a random character to me, never the less the story was chilling and it showed the readers why the veteran had turned into what he is now. I noticed how Murakami loves giving us an in depth detail on a characters background, it really makes the book more mysterious and it felt like the book was made up of individual stories told by the different characters at different times. It  also felt like the book was a pile of feelings and emotions. And, yet these characters are people who seemingly have no emotions whatsoever to speak of.

 I found it quite frustrating when Murakami suddenly cuts Toru off whenever he was the one asking questions, it made him force himself to think and find the answer, but he does keep me on my edge of the seat with his twists and turns that shock the protagonist himself. But, I was confused as to why the book had to take a supernatural turn, it was really interesting to see a "dream prostitute" as in a prostitute who pleasures you in your dreams. But till now my question is  as Toru is trying to decide what to do with his life after quitting his job, and is being constantly challenged as he encounters new people on his journey. What effect does this have on the main character?

Even though I dont like May as much one of her quotes is stuck in my head :
“I’m only sixteen,” she said, “and I don’t know much about the world, but I do know one thing for sure. If I’m pessimistic, then the adults in this world who are not pessimistic are a bunch of idiots.”

Murakami's Style

One thing I noticed was Murakami's persistence to accurately describe every single thing that is going on in the setting. This can be noticed since the first famous phone call, in which Toru's spaghetti-making is almost painted for the reader. May's house is also described perfectly, so is the alley that leads to it, and so is every shop or building any one character walks into. It is sort of like Murakami is there, yet you don't know. The descriptions are so vivid, and the small details that are omnipresent help add to the reality of the novel. I had two main reactions to this.

1) In the beginning, when I was getting used to the characters, the setting, (since Japan and Japanese culture is not something I am spectacularly familiar with), I found descriptions of even minuscule details very helpful to contextualize the story, the plot, and its charactes.

2) Yet as the story goes on, and the reader becomes more and more accustomed with the characters and how they fit it with the plot and with each other, and since most of the story happens around the same settings: Toru's or May's house, etc, the descriptions, that are always there turn from an asset into a liability for the book. They are often tedious, since the reader has seen them quite often already, and distract the reader from the main plot or important segment of the chapter.

Maybe Murakami doesn't even do this initially to help the reader, perhaps it is just accidental and is just integrated in his narrative style and the way he writes, but I found that it went from pleasing and helpful to a tad bit annoying.

What do you think?

Creta Kano

One of the characters that really got my attention was Creta Kano. One reason obviously is that she not only has a verbal connection, but also sexual (and also kind of subconscious, through the wet dreams) to Toru, the main character. Also, in the meetings with Toru, when she comes to his house, she seems much more friendly than her sister, and also is a lot more open. On both occasions, Creta shares parts of her story doing with Noburu Wataya, and how he defiled her, and about her quest in being reborn, as she defines it. The fact that she is so open and honest with Toru, a complete stranger initially, highlights the importance of him to her, and the strength of the relationship.  Furthermore, Creta at one poin invites Toru to go to Crete with her. Although both characters agree that this is both abrupt and spontaneous, this bold action does everything to underline the important connection between the two. This invitation also foreshadows that perhaps their relationship will go even further, as the two will now spend a great deal of time by themselves, alone. Maybe Creta is Murakami's character that helps Toru the most, or plays a more important role that other characters, in the sense that she affects Toru more.

Do you guys think that other characters are more important? If so, why? Do you think Creta will have an important role? I have only read until book 2, so I can't know for sure.

Coincidences?

One thing I noticed was the continuous appearances of coincidences throughout the book. Two very obvious ones: 1) When Toru finds out from Malta that he will receive an important call from "O", he immediately eliminates the liquor store, and that ends up being the call he receives. Although the meaning of this phone call (one of the motifs) is not revealed yet, it is interesting that the person that calls him is the one that Toru was 100% sure that it couldn't be. 2) After Toru comes out of the well in Book 2, and finds out that Creta also has been missing for a while, the first person he sees when he walks out is Creta. Further coincidences involving Creta include the one where she is the woman that shows up naked in bed (also the one he had wet dreams about).

Perhaps the coincidences are Murakami's way of placing emphasis on fate, other than Mr. Honda and the Kano sisters, who seem to have a grasp on fate and the future that surpasses the one of a normal human being, and also to intertwine the characters even more. All the characters seem to have bonds to Toru Okada, but none have direct links between each other, or none that we can see in the book. This is interesting as in centralizes the story even more around the main character and therefore allows for multiple story lines.

What do you think the coincidences are for? Are they casual or deliberate? Do they have a deeper meaning?

First Impressions

Although the book went off to a quite boring start, the author is very good ad giving twists to the story, and in a cryptic manner to always keep the reader hooked. The first inclusion of the mystery phone woman always keeps the reader always hooked. This technique can be seen several times through out the book, with the inclusion of other strange characters, like Malta, Creta and May, who never reveal much about themselves, and always keep both the protagonist and the reader confused. Most people seem to have commented that Murakami seems to insert random passages (or they might seem random) in the plot, in digressions to perhaps distract the reader. I noticed that as well, and I find it quite frustrating, like when Toru talks about when he fled his house without his parents knowing and came back, and they still hadn't noticed he was gone, or the detailed description of the Nomohoman battle or the operation  in Mongolia where the body was skinned. One thing I noted was that these passages tend to be quite descriptive and lack in dialogue compared to the rest of the story, like for example the military part in Mongolia. I must admit this book has surpassed my expectations, especially with the inclusion of intriguing characters such as Malta and Creta who add  suspense and mystery to the plot.

Also, the author seems to employ a lot of foreshadowing, especially in Book 1 where we find ourselves in the introductory stages of the book still.  The most evident case is when Toru tells the reader that he told Kumiko that once slept (in a bed, not intercourse, just slept) with another woman, and Kumiko warns him one day it will happen to him, and in the end she ends up having an affair. There are also a lot of motifs in the book, like the phone calls that were described by Arri, who always have an underlying meaning in the life of the protagonist, and also music, which Toru always notices no matter where he enters ( laundry shop for example) . I'm not entirely sure what the music motif is, just that it is very recurring and that the songs always seem to fit the situation, "Eight Days a Week" for example, by the Beatles.

First Impressions Book Two: Bird as a Prophet

I have been enjoying The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle so far, although I think it's very strange. Toru Okada, who seems to be a very normal and rather monotone person who doesn't really have any interesting things happen to him, suddenly starts meeting the strangest people like Malta and Creta Kano, May Kasahara, then getting phone calls from the strange woman. He seems to go along with everything without thinking that anything is too weird; being set up with Malta Kano by his wife about the cat, going on a job with May Kasahara, etc. Book One seems like an introduction to something important and definite that will change Toru's life in Book Two and Book Three. Already the first sentence of Book Two shows us that something has changed in the plot, "Kumiko never came back that night." A short sentence that carries a sense of foreboding. Immediately the reader assumes, just like Toru, that Kumiko has left him for another man. There were foreshadowings in Book One to suggest the same thing; the expensive cologne she avoided talking about, the fact that she had been coming in late recently and that she had been having mood swings, all gave the readers an idea that Kumiko was perhaps hiding something. In Book Two, when Toru finds out that Kumiko never came back that night, he has a sense of helplesness that overwhelms him and frustrates the reader. His general reactions seem too neutral and nonchalant for someone who's wife seems to have just left and annoyed me. After searching the house, he even says, "There was nothing more for me to do." as if the situation is completely out of his hands. He makes breakfast and realizes that it is the first time in years that he had eaten breakfast alone, since both he an Kumiko usually made an effort to have breakfast together. The way Kumiko has run off seems strange however, because she doesn't take any clothes with her (which Toru states are very important to Kumiko) and she doesn't go to work that day, which hints that it may not be just a simple case of Kumiko running off with another man. It seems that she has disappeared. Only after he checks if she has taken any clothes with her, does Toru consider the possibility that she might have had an accident or something might have happened to her, but he discards them as unlikely.

Afterwards, Toru gets a phone call from Malta Kano about the cat (which he had completely forgotten about) and then she asks him if there's something else she can help him with, which is when Toru tells her that he thinks Kumiko has left him. The response he receives from Malta Kano give the reader the impression that she knows more than she tells Toru about the entire affair. That's when he asks her impatiently to give her "concrete facts", something that he can "see and touch" and not just vague responses, so Malta Kano tells him to wait for a phone call from someone who's name begins with O. Phone calls have a significant meaning in this novel, right from the very beginning when Toru gets the phone call from the strange woman, and just like Toru tells Malta Kano, "Waiting for a phone call is all I've been doing."

 Murakami seems to like to distract the reader in the middle of passages with random events. For example, right after Toru asks Malta Kano for "concrete facts" he says he can hear something falling through the phone; "something not very heavy - perhaps a single pearl - dropping onto a wooden floor. This was followed by a rubbing sound, as if a piece of tracing paper was being held in someone's fingertips and given a vigorous yank." The sound doesn't seem to be very important, just something that Toru hears in the background through the phone with Malta Kano, but Murakami adds it anyway with a lot of detail, perhaps to give a more realistic effect, but it could also be something significant later on. Do these descriptions really add anything to the story? They just seem to distract the reader before Murakami continues with the story.