Haruki Murakami • Non-Gaming • Books • Eurogamer.net

boo 28 Aug 2008 09:22:05 13,901 posts
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I'd never heard of him, but I picked up After Dark on a whim after seeing somebody reading it on the tube.

Absolutely loved it!

Anybody read any of his other stuff? Judging by the Amazon reviews, his work is a bit hit and miss.

Looking, preferably, for a hit, rather than a miss...

Edit - fixxored

Edit, edit - cheers Roy - spotted it!

craigy Staff 28 Aug 2008 09:22:52 9,500 posts
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I wanna get "What I Talk About When I Talk About Running" - I hear he's a pretty nifty author.

magicpanda 28 Aug 2008 09:24:03 15,130 posts
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Get Hard Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World. Amazing stuff

markh 28 Aug 2008 09:24:10 3,599 posts
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Kafka on the shore and Norwegian Wood are both fantastic

I'm midway through After Dark at the moment.

RMXtreme 28 Aug 2008 09:25:03 3,145 posts
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I've only read one of his books: Kafka on the Shore. I thought the first half of the book was great, but the second half not so much.

famous_roy 28 Aug 2008 09:28:52 4,126 posts
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Post deleted

UncleLou Moderator 28 Aug 2008 09:29:56 40,723 posts
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He's great.

I've got to admit though that I found Hard-bolied Wonderland a bit tedious. My favourite is The Wind-Up Bird Chronicles.

famous_roy 28 Aug 2008 09:30:21 4,126 posts
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boo wrote:
I'd never heard of him, but I picked up After Dark on a whim after seeing somebody reading it on the tube.

Absolutely loved it!

Anybody read any of his other stuff? Judging by the Amazon reviews, his work is a bit hit and miss.

Looking, preferably, for a hit, rather than a miss...

Edit - no idea what's up with the link borkage...

There ya go salad, some of the beginning of your tag was missing.

On another note, fucking love Murakami! Dance Dance Dance, Kafka on the Shore and Wind up Bird are my faves!

FabricatedLunatic 28 Aug 2008 09:31:19 13,125 posts
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I've read Norwegian Wood and Sputnik Sweetheart and loved them both.

JuanKerr 28 Aug 2008 09:31:35 37,710 posts
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Another Kafka fan here. Great stuff.

ilmaestro 28 Aug 2008 09:35:19 32,932 posts
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I am also a fan of Murakami, Norwegian Wood is probably the most easily recommendable of his books, for me.

boo 28 Aug 2008 09:42:04 13,901 posts
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I've ordered Wind Up Bird... and Hard Boiled...

I'll see how I get on with them. Cheers for the recommendations.

ilmaestro 28 Aug 2008 09:48:39 32,932 posts
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Yep, that John Woo film will be a nice change of pace after reading a book.

famous_roy 28 Aug 2008 10:00:14 4,126 posts
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Hehe, aw bless..

TakeTheVeil 28 Aug 2008 10:23:15 5,057 posts
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Yeah, its the only Murakami novel ive read too but it was savage so i'll pick up another soon enough.

Working through 'Atlas Shrugged' at the moment and i've Moby Dick lined up next..but THEN it'll be Murakami. I'll *interesting* this thread so..

dmj 28 Aug 2008 10:31:50 1,081 posts
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Norwegian Wood is probably his easiest book to get into. My favourite is The Wind-up Bird Chronicle. South of the Border, West of the Sun is lovely, too. All of his stuff's great, mind.

I've just got hold of Pinball, 1973 (in pdf as it's not available outside of Japan, though you can get it in English there, I believe) but haven't had a chance to start it.

ilmaestro 28 Aug 2008 10:36:13 32,932 posts
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I was going to mention South of the Border, West of the Sun, as I think it's an excellent change of pace from his more popular books.

Shinzou 28 Aug 2008 10:43:38 887 posts
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No love for A Wild Sheep Chase? I loved it. Have only read that and Kafka.

dmj 28 Aug 2008 10:48:48 1,081 posts
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I was going to mention South of the Border, West of the Sun, as I think it's an excellent change of pace from his more popular books.

Yeah. It's less surreal than his other stuff (the fiction, at least. I find Underground a bit surreal, though for different reasons). Until the last third, anyway.

craigy Staff 28 Aug 2008 13:24:37 9,500 posts
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Gah, this thread made me run out and buy "What I Talk About When I Talk About Running" at lunch.

gang_of_bitches 28 Aug 2008 13:37:07 5,707 posts
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He's great and while stylistically very distinctive I love the way he can do the simple short stories, surreal and more mainstream novels as well as fact based stuff.

I also love the the fact that he's become really popular partly because he deserves it, but mostly because I have a signed limited edition of Norwegian Wood which is currently listed by an internet seller for �1000.

pjmaybe 28 Aug 2008 13:40:59 70,666 posts
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Kafka & Norwegian Wood rawkkk

ElectricDemon 28 Aug 2008 13:56:21 2,415 posts
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I've only read Norwegian Wood, but it's very good. Enjoyed it so much I used it as one of my books for my English dissertation =)

Agent_Llama 28 Aug 2008 14:05:05 3,691 posts
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Only read After Dark and wasn't keen, I found it a bit dull. Some beautiful language though. I have Dance Dance Dance to read and want to read Kafka and Norwegian Wood as I've heard they're much better.

boo 28 Aug 2008 14:08:26 13,901 posts
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As I said at the beginning - loved After Dark. It came across as a mix of 'Lost In Translation' and 'Before Sunrise', with a bit of surreal-ness chucked in for good measure.

All of which are good things, in my book.

funkstar 28 Aug 2008 14:08:53 3,280 posts
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his book of short stories 'after the quake' is also fairly awesome, and im at the moment working my way through 'blind willow, sleeping woman' another (more subtantial) collection of short stories

dmj 28 Aug 2008 19:57:23 1,081 posts
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craigy wrote:
Gah, this thread made me run out and buy "What I Talk About When I Talk About Running" at lunch.

It's good to have him write about himself for a change. Also good if you're a runner. Wish I had the free time to run as many marathons as he does.

Deleted user 28 August 2008 20:43:06

I absolutely hated Dance Dance Dance, but I enjoyed Kafka On The Shore, up until about 100 pages from the end. The most disappointing thing about both books is how much I thought I was going to love them when I started, but Dance, in particular, just led me up so many blind alleys and got me so frustrated that I almost felt like quitting it.

I wonder how much of it is due to the translations, but I just found after a couple of hundred pages that I really didn't care for anyone in the book in the slightest, I didn't care what fantastical, spiritual happenings were going to befall them, and I just wanted it to end.

EDIT: Incidentally, I read Dance Dance Dance not long after I read Number9Dream, by David Mitchell, and it's immediately obvious from having read the two so close together, that Mitchell is a massive Murakami "fan"...