1Q84

This is Murakami's one-hit-wonder I read when the English translation came out about ten years ago and it was before I realised how bad Murakami is at writing female characters, how much he relies on stock Boring Shy Nerdy Male protagonists who everyone wants to sleep with for some unfathomable reason. Upon reflection, these same flaws stare back at me in the plot with the teacher and the autistic-coded student, but they weren't apparent enough in 1Q84 to stop me from enjoying it. The plain and unmotivated aspect of the professor and his creepy treatment of the student were easy enough to mostly ignore among the other less-boring male characters, the translation's prose was fairly good ('Hair straight as if each strand were drawn like a ruler.' I remember that line to this day.), and Aomame's quiet determination is so vastly different from any other Murakami female character! Not to mention the surrealness of the Other World and its magical creatures is charming, whimsical, and neither exaggerated nor over-thought; it simply fits right in with everything else. Heck I may even re-read it!

Woe to my disappointment when a) it is revealed that Aomame isn't gay (grumble, grumble) and b) the above sexism and possibly ableism that are much harder to ignore in Murakami's other work. In spite of this, I still enjoy and appreciate the parts of this novel that I do.

1) "Janáček composed his little symphony in 1926. He originally wrote the opening as a fanfare for a gymnastics festival. Aomame imagined 1926 Czechoslovakia: The First World War had ended, and the country was freed from the long rule of the Hapsburg Dynasty. As they enjoyed the peaceful respite visiting central Europe, people drank Pilsner beer in cafés and manufactured handsome light machine guns. Two years earlier, in utter obscurity, Franz Kafka had left the world behind. Soon Hitler would come out of nowhere and gobble up this beautiful little country in the blink of an eye, but at the time no one knew what hardships lay in store for them. This may be the most important proposition revealed by history: 'At the time, no one knew what was coming.'"

2) "I'm here, but I'm not here. I'm in two places at once. It goes against Einstein's theorem, but what the hell. Call it the Zen of the killer."

3) "'Hmm. Real life is different from math. Things in life don't necessarily flow over the shortest possible route. For me, math is—how should I put it?—math is all too natural. It's like beautiful scenery. It's just there. There's no need to exchange it with anything else. That's why, when I'm doing math, I sometimes feel I'm turning transparent. And that can be scary.' Fuka-Eri kept looking straight into Tengo's eyes as if she were looking into an empty house with her face pressed up against the glass. Tengo said, 'When I'm writing a story, I use words to transform the surrounding scene into something more natural for me. In other words, I reconstruct it. That way, I can confirm without a doubt that this person known as 'me' exists in the world. This is a totally different process from steeping myself in the world of math.' 'You confirm that you exist,' Fuka-Eri said. 'I can't say I've been one hundred percent successful at it,' Tengo said."

4) "'I am not a professional, or a pervert, just an ordinary citizen. An ordinary citizen who wants nothing more than to have intercourse with a member of the opposite sex. There's nothing special about me. I'm totally normal.'"

5) "'Do you give them names?' Aomame asked, curious. 'Like dogs or cats?' The dowager gave her head a little shake. 'No, I don't give them names, but I can tell one from another by their shapes and patterns. And besides, there wouldn't be much point in giving them names: they die so quickly. These people are your nameless friends for just a little while. I come here every day, say hello to the butterflies, and talk about things with them. When the time comes, though, they just quietly go off and disappear. I'm sure it means they've died, but I can never find their bodies. They don't leave any trace behind. It's as if they've been absorbed by the air. They're dainty little creatures that hardly exist at all: they come out of nowhere, search quietly for a few, limited things, and disappear into nothingness again, perhaps to some other world.'"

6) "Of course, it's all just a hypothesis, Aomame told herself as she walked. But it's the most compelling hypothesis I can produce at the moment. I'll have to act according to this one, I suppose, until a more compelling hypothesis comes along. Otherwise, I could end up being thrown to the ground somewhere. If only for that reason, I'd better give an appropriate name to this new situation in which I find myself. There's a need, too, for a special name in order to distinguish between this present world and the former world in which the police carried old-fashioned revolvers. Even cats and dogs need names. A newly changed world must need one, too. 1Q84—that's what I'll call this new world, Aomame decided. Q is for 'question mark.' A world that bears a question."

7) "Some time had to pass before she was able to grasp what the difference was. And even after she had grasped it, she had to work hard to accept it. What her vision had seized upon, her mind could not easily confirm. There were two moons in the sky—a small moon and a large one. They were floating there side by side. The large one was the usual moon that she had always seen. It was nearly full, and yellow. But there was another moon right next to it. It had an unfamiliar shape. It was somewhat lopsided, and greenish, as though thinly covered with moss."

8) "With his penis still resting on the palm of her hand, Tengo began to speak. 'The story is about me—or about somebody modeled on me.' 'I'm sure it is,' she said. 'Am I in it?' 'No, you're not. I'm in a world that isn't here.' 'So I'm not in the world that isn't here.' 'And not just you. The people who are in this world are not in the world that isn't here.' 'How is the world that isn't here different from this world? Can you tell which world you're in now?' 'Of course I can. I'm the one who's writing it.' 'What I mean is, for people other than you. Say, if I just happened to wander into that world now, could I tell?' 'I think you could,' Tengo said. 'For example, in the world that isn't here, there are two moons. So you can tell the difference.'"

9) "'They have been called by many different names, but in most cases have not been called anything at all. They were simply there. The expression 'Little People' is just an expedient. My daughter called them that when she was very young and brought them with her.' 'Then you became a king.' The man drew a strong breath in through his nose and held it in his lungs for a time before releasing it slowly. 'I am no king. I became one who listens to the voices.' 'And now you are seeking to be slaughtered.' 'No, it need not be a slaughter. This is 1984, and we are in the middle of the big city. There is no need for a brutal, bloody killing. All you have to do is take my life. It can be neat and simple.'"

10) "Outside the window, the thunder-without-lightning rumbled with increased force. Raindrops pelted the glass. The two of them were in an ancient cave—a dark, damp, low-ceilinged cave. Dark beasts and spirits surrounded the entrance. For the briefest instant around her, light and shadow became one. A nameless gust of wind blew through the distant channel. That was the signal. Aomame brought her fist down in one short, precise movement. Everything ended in silence. The beasts and spirits heaved a deep breath, broke up their encirclement, and returned to the depths of a forest that had lost its heart."

11) "Ushikawa left his camera, leaned back against the wall, and looked up at the stained ceiling. Soon everything struck him as empty. He had never felt so utterly alone, never felt the dark to be this intense. He remembered his house back in Chuorinkan, his lawn and his dog, his wife and two daughters, the sunlight shining there. And he thought of the DNA he had given to his daughters, the DNA for a misshapen head and a twisted soul."

12) "His father's passing didn't particularly shock Tengo. He had spent two solid weeks beside his unconscious father. He already felt that his father had accepted his impending death. The doctors weren't able to determine what had put him into a coma, but Tengo knew. His father had simply decided to die, or else had abandoned the will to live any longer. To borrow Kumi's phrase, as a 'single leaf on a tree,' he turned off the light of consciousness, closed the door on any senses, and waited for the change of seasons."

13) "Aomame mourned the deaths of these two friends deeply. It saddened her to think that these women were forever gone from the world. And she mourned their lovely breasts—breasts that had vanished without a trace."

DNF'd because it isn't good and I realized I was only 10% through. I couldn't take another bad Sexual conversation or pedophilic line of thought.

29 year old Tengo has an uncomfortably pedophilic perspective of a 17 year old.

Aomame has very awkward Sexual encounters. Sean Connery's head shape is mentioned many times.

There is a preoccupation with boob size and the shape of women's bodies.

And I quote:

His penis was in fact somewhat larger than normal, though not too large, as advertised. Aomame's expert handling soon made it big and hard. She took off her blouse and skirt.

"I know youre thinking my breasts are small," she said coldly as she looked down at him in her underwear. "You came through with a good-sized cock and all you get in return is these puny things. I bet you feel cheated."'

I have adored Murakami’s work immensely in the past but 1Q84 was a bit of a meandering slog. A bit clumsy, repetitive, and perhaps needlessly drawn out. I’m beginning to believe that Murakami is at his best when his writing is short.

This is a classic conundrum I sometimes find myself in. Is my distaste by design? Were the aspects of the book I dislike deliberately put there to antagonize me, or perhaps to immerse me in the feelings and experience of the characters? Or was it just an oddly self-indulgent piece of writing with no regard for its reader? I love the often-surreal and slightly mystical stream of consciousness narrative Murakami tends toward. However, to the extent that was present here, it was overwrought and overshadowed by so many problems that begin to take hold in the second book.

The portrayal of women, for example, is profoundly unflattering and borderline misogynistic. Is that a projection of Murakami’s genuine perspective or is Murakami merely the meta-author of a story written by Tengo and thus should we read it as the manifestation of Tengo’s sexualizing, misogynistic gaze? WHO KNOWS!

I’m normally up to be confronted and antagonized by an artist and their work, but I want the takeaway and the experience to pay off. Unfortunately this did not hit that mark.

Writing about my favorite parts of 1Q84 would spoil the surprise for others. And I believe the book's strength is weird "left field" turns and ironies.

Giving it three stars and don't have energy to go into why other than to say the book is just Way Too Long. I know this is lazy and misses the point of a review.... kind of like douche-level reviews of hiking trails such as "hill was too high, no restaurant on top". But there it is.

This book had potential. What's NOT to like about a book that has a female assassin as one of its protagonists?

Turns out:
1. It's too long. (As an audiobook it's 46 hours long!)
2. It doesn't really have a point. After 46 hours I expect a big pay-off. Nope.
3. It's oddly preoccupied with sex. I feel like the author has some fetishes to work out.
4. Did I mention: it's unnecessarily long. Someone needs an editor.

To his credit, the author is imaginative. I just won't be reading another book by him.

oh for fuck's sake. i've been meaning to read this damn thing since it came out, and was so excited, based on the first fifty pages or so that i read years ago. well, i finished it, and what a letdown. so many rehashes of the same events. so many descriptions of boobs. so little plot. so little dimensionality in these characters.

Couldn't put it down. Murakami's gotta Murakami and I am here for it! Particularly touched me since the funeral chapter was at the same time I was actually prepping and attending a funeral in my real life. Murakami is so good at capturing the emotions by making the reader observe the details.

1Q84 begins as an intriguing and fanciful story about a woman whose impromptu decision leads her to a world that is not quite her own; a world with strange, supernatural features around the edges.

I like the central story, but that story is told in a way that is often off-putting, full of tedious repetition and digression.

How repetitive is this book? There are multiple times where we watch a character go through a particular series of events, followed promptly by a section just as long in which that characters thinks about those events and there are redescribed in as much detail as was given the first time. In these repeats, we do not generally learn new information or see how characters reinterpret and expand on events; we just get the same story told a second time.

The book also loves extraneous detail. Characters often tedious muse about the past or the present or about trivial occurrences. I found myself skimming quite a bit of the book, although while most times these digressions never connected with the story, sometimes they actually did, which meant you could never skim in perfect safety.

The characters are fairly likable although I didn't end the book caring more than a little about any of them. In part, this is because I couldn't quite believe in them. This is particularly true of the women; according to the author, most women spend a huge amount of time thinking about their breasts and other women's breasts, and I'm just not convinced that's true.

Still, 1Q84 creates a nice amount of intrigue and mystery. Unfortunately, the author gets lazy about it. After building up the mystery for the half the book, many of the central puzzles are explained by a supernatural character who just says, okay, here's what's going on. While it was a relief to get an explanation, an info dump from an all-knowing prophet seemed like a cheap payoff.

The author also drags his heels mightily on getting to the end of the book, as you constantly feel things are about to reach a turning point they never seem to get to.

My overall impression is the author thought it would be neat to write a really, really long novel but didn't actually have much to say. I would much have preferred to read a Reader's Digest version of this that cut it down by about 70%. I think you could do that without losing a single important thing.

I didn't hate it, it has its moments, it did keep me curious, but I can't heartily recommend it, even if I wouldn't go as far as warning people away.

This is the first book I have read by Murakami.

I loved it. I listened to much of it via the audiobook on Audible, which was done excellently with collaborating voice actors. If I was only reading the book, without slipping into the audiobook when on the road, I think this may have been more difficult to get through.

Strange. Surreal. Hilarious. Weird sex scenes likely not to be found in other books. Cults. Questioning reality.

The audiobook included an interview with the two translators that worked on 1Q84 english translation. Strangely, one of them worked on the first two parts while the other worked on part three. Both of them worked alone, without collaboration by the sounds of it. Seems fitting for this weird story. I honestly couldn't tell in the audiobook, but perhaps I would have noticed a slight style difference if I was only reading it myself? Without the assistance of the voice actors persisting across all parts?

Definitely keeping a copy of it on my bookshelf, and I highly recommend the audiobook is one wants to experience another element to the storytelling. I've purchased a few of his other books that I'll need to read through next.

Well, damn. That was a long, long ride.

This has everything he's known for, but it's drawn out to the plausible extreme. This is a work that'll creep... up... on... you... like moss.

But a good moss. A friendly moss. A moss that, once it arrives, it's comforting and makes you go "ah." It's one of those mosses that had been secretly nourishing things and you didn't realize it. It's probably not even a moss you'd appreciate, because tastes would differ. Or something.

Wait, does moss even work like that? Where was I?

But seriously.

The one major detraction of this work is the pacing. I'm one to linger in what I'm reading, but even here I had bouts of impatience. There's a lot of repetition, and what I'd classify as "padding" as well. (In quotes because if you skim, chances are very high you could miss one tiny, crucial detail. It's that sorta novel.)

And the characters aren't the most... fleshed out. They played their bits. And in Tengo's case, he was unforgivably boring. I can say with a certainty, this: if 2/3rd through the first book and you still don't care about these people, don't waste your time and just put the book down.

I can't recommend it if this'd be your first Murakami novel. Read some of his other (and shorter, ha!) works first to see if you like his style. I do, and that was the sole reason why I stuck with this book(s) entire (oh, and for Fuka-Eri; she was pretty cool IMO). But even then it was tough.

I've a feeling it'll linger for quite awhile. (The good lingering. The friendly lingering...) EDIT: I'm left with... something. And I'm still not entirely sure if the lingering is friendly or good.

Ho ho, says the keeper of the beat.