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Review #1
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Title: Immensely rewarding, flawlessly written, tough to crack.
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Rating: 4
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Review:
Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World (hereinbelow referred to as Wonderland, for obvious reasons) is a fantastic story of a man who lives in two very different worlds. Murakami is the kind of modern author most big-name reviewers refer to as "hip", "jazzy" and "dazzling," but for the rest of us, he just speaks in a say-it-like-you-mean-it language that communicates directly with your spinal cord. He's always up to something in Wonderland, and yet it's never quite clear what. His main character, as in his other novels A Wild Sheep Chase and Dance, Dance, Dance, is an outsider who lets the world go by with only the odd blip on his otherwise quiescent radar screen. He's easy to identify with, and lets you see Murakami's two worlds through perfectly "him"-colored glasses. Alfred Birnbaum's translation (Murakami writes only in Japanese) is nothing short of perfect. The prose reads as though it came from an American pen, which, paradoxically, is one of the elements which has made Murakami a multi-million-book bestseller in Japan. Wonderland is by turns a page-turner, an escapist fantasy, a biting social commentary, and a serene meditation; all of these are testaments to Murakami's clever (and at times inscrutable) pacing, and also a nod toward his high regard for the entertainment value of literature. Of the three books mentioned above, it is by far my favorite, though it's perhaps less accessible than A Wild Sheep Chase. Give Murakami a chance. He knows what he's doing, and he has fashioned a a pair of worlds that you appreciate more and more as you live in them.
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Review #2
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Title: The Town in Your Mind
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Rating: 5
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Review: This was the seventh Haruki Murakami novel I've read. I was worried about this book. Although I have read and enjoyed other books by Murakami, I held this one off with a stick because I was frightened by the word Cyberpunk. I'm not a science fiction fan. The only other book that I have read that had a Cyberpunk theme was William Gibson's Neuromancer, which was so full of technological jargon that I had no idea what I was reading. I was worried this book was going to be the same, but I lucked out, the protagonist of the story really doesn't understand much of hat is happening to him or of the abilities that have been planted in his brain, so I found the book quite easy to read. The main character of the book is a nameless 35 year old man who works for the System, basically dealing in information, He meets quite colorful characters along the way: A genius Scientist, a pink loving young lady who wants to get him into the sack, and a slim pretty libraian who has a bottomless pit for a stomach. The main fascination that this book hold, however, is the parallel world that is inside the protagonist's mind a world of his own creation world that is his own prison. Read this book!
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Review #3
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Title: SUPPOSE THE EARTH WERE NOT A SPHERE BUT A GIGANTIC COFFEE
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Rating: 3
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Review: ...TABLE? "I mean, for a guy leading a perfectly ordinary existence, how many times in the course of a lifetime would the equator be a significant factor?" This book was a somewhat difficult read. I am used to a gentler Murakami style, and this book did not adhere to that formula, which only attests to Murakami's genius, even if this book was not as appealing to me personally. The book seems to take a cue from the fantasy realm populated by books such as Douglas Adams' Hitchhikers' Guide to the Galaxy. At times the book was so far outside the lines of reality and so far into technological psychobabble and artful, creative meanderings of the writer's mind that it is positively confusing to decipher. It was indeed quite thought-provoking and at times quite vivid in creating certain feelings in the reader (for example, claustrophobia and fear in the section when the main character is wandering through underground caves with another person). The book can be fascinating, technical, murky, strange, engaging, and eccentric all at once. The use of the word "wonderland" in the title is quite fitting. Interestingly, the book points out some very obvious things which we never think about. For example, the main character is part of a life, an organization, that the average citizen knows nothing about. His life is completely a mystery, and even if he were to describe it to someone they would find him crazy. It illustrates how little we really know about other people and how cut off from experience we are. In our society we are able to see news 24 hours a day and are content thinking that we have all the facts, when in fact, we never know what is propaganda if we never seek out alternative media sources. For example. An interesting point to make is that this book is like reading two separate books. In alternating chapters, two stories are told, although one appears to be the everyday life of the narrator and the alternate chapters are of a town that is actually the narrator's unconscious mind. Because this book was a bit confusing I am not certain that my interpretation is correct nor that it is the only interpretation. In fact, I am sure that many different people could come up with infinite interpretations. As a result of experiments conducted on the narrator without his knowledge, it is clear that he will lose his conscious mind, as he knows it, and live in a world of his own creation in his mind. New memories are created by some sort of implants in his mind that bridge different parts of his brain (natural and implanted), creating a parallel world he will come to live in. It is not clear if he literally lives or dies. But it does not matter. This is a carefully crafted work that requires thought.
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