Norwegian Wood: Haruki Murakami

Norwegian Wood
Haruki Murakami
Jay Rubin (Translator)
296pp


Today we present the work that made the man... or at least made him famous.

For a Murakami book, this is mostly just a straightforward love and sexual exploration vehicle. His writing on love and sex are, as always, worthy of a read, but there isn't anything all that special here.

Toru finds love, loses it, finds it in other places, and loses it all in many ways.

Again, well written, but lacking in the depth that Murakami at times brings.

It was with the release of Norwegian Wood that Murakami began to become a household name, and honestly this is possibly a regretful thing.

Possibly, I say, and not surely, because as I've brought up throughout my looks at Murakami, I think that at his best he is worthy of much of the praise given him. I'd love to see him get his Nobel Prize on account of his skills, and the fact that I have an obvious bias to see another Japanese author win. Therefore, for any book to have brought him to the public eye is great.

However, for it to have been this book as opposed to some others I would consider better (for an early accessible work I'd go with Wild Sheep Chase) and for a moderately good (thought beautiful) straightforward work to be the entry point for this author is disappointing. Murakami is attempting to a different kind of novel, a kind of psychological, magically realistic world where truth is hidden behind every corner.


So, a short review here for a work that didn't deeply work for me. Recommended mildly for completest or those looking to try Murakami without all the thinking.