Hacker Newsnew | past | comments | ask | show | jobs | submitlogin

The only Murakami novel that has the author lose a cat, his wife and encounter "something magical that is somehow related to the Manchuria war" is The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle. I can only assume you read it twice by mistake.

Several of his novels do feature a man with a cat, and several novels feature distant women. But if I remember correctly, the only other married narrator is the protagonist in South of the Border, West of the Sun, and there is a character in 1Q84 who is married and divorced.

To say that the plots of any of his books have exactly the same plot would be a huge mischaracterization, though. The only two books that are even vaguely similar are Wind-Up and the earlier Dance Dance Dance (the last part of a quadrilogy about the "Sheep Man"); the latter feels a lot like a preliminary sketch for the vastly superior Wind-Up, in particular the fascination about hotel rooms and shared dreams. But the plots are completely different.



Kafka by the River is also related to missing cats (killed), ancient wars and something magical. I loved Kafka by the River, but couldn't finish The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle.


Kafka by the Shore. It is very different from Wind-Up Bird even though there are cats in it.

I recommend trying Wind-Up again. The first ~100 pages are difficult to get through at times (the narrator is infuriatingly apathetic), but one you get past that, it's an incredible page turner. I liked Kafka a lot, but Wind-Up is his masterpiece.




Guidelines | FAQ | Lists | API | Security | Legal | Apply to YC | Contact

Search: