Rated of 5
by SG Griffith Mixed emotions
This is a fascinating book, with surprising and original elements that appear more surrealistically than magically. Two main characters walk their paths through these images, while trying to find a place in shifting realities. Like the Wind-UpBird Chronicle by the same author, this is a love story.
One character perceives a cat town, the other 1Q84, a play on Orwell's novel.
Fascism and cultism strive for influence in Murakami's fictional Japan. Yukio Mishima must be in the author's mind, and his novels or the excellent film about his life would be worth investigation (Mishima: A Life in Four Chapters).
Violence against women is a theme here as well, with women taking charge, sometimes successfully, sometimes not.
This book is very long, and there is a great deal of repetition, which increases toward the end. I have read that in Japan, where it was originally published, the novel came out in two parts originally. Then a third and final section was added. It may be that the rhythm was broken at that point, but you should read it for yourself and decide.
Stranger than fiction, blending tragedy and farce, How to Create the Perfect Wife is an engrossing tale of the radicalism, and deep contradictions, at the heart of the Enlightenment.
Z, the novel about the life of Zelda Sayre Fitzgerald is at points charming and; like another reviewer, I kept thinking of the movie, "Midnight...
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Although heavy on the scientific details, which slowed down the story for me (OK, I admit, I was one of those liberal arts majors who skipped out on...
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Loved this book. Magical, quirky, enchanting I could go on. All books do not have to be literary fiction, sometimes it is just so comforting to read...
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U.S. ebook sales up in 2012, but rate of growth is slowing(May 16 2013) In 2012, trade book sales (i.e. non academic book sales) rose 6.9%, to $15.049 billion, and e-book sales continued to grow, although the rate of growth...
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