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The Wind-up Bird Chronicle

(The Complete Classics)

By Haruki Murakami, Rupert Degas (Narrator)

(220)

| Audio CD | 9789626344187

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Book Description

Japan's most highly regarded novelist now vaults into the first ranks of international fiction writers with this heroically imaginative novel, which is at once a detective story, an account of a disintegrating marriage, and an excavation of the buried secrets of World War II.

In a Tokyo subuContinue

Japan's most highly regarded novelist now vaults into the first ranks of international fiction writers with this heroically imaginative novel, which is at once a detective story, an account of a disintegrating marriage, and an excavation of the buried secrets of World War II.

In a Tokyo suburb a young man named Toru Okada searches for his wife's missing cat.  Soon he finds himself looking for his wife as well in a netherworld that lies beneath the placid surface of Tokyo.  As these searches intersect, Okada encounters a bizarre group of allies and antagonists: a psychic prostitute; a malevolent yet mediagenic politician; a cheerfully morbid sixteen-year-old-girl; and an aging war veteran who has been permanently changed by the hideous things he witnessed during Japan's forgotten campaign in Manchuria.

Gripping, prophetic, suffused with comedy and menace, The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle is a tour de force equal in scope to the masterpieces of Mishima and Pynchon.

Critics

  • The Wind-up Bird Chronicle

    Having quit his job, Toru Okada is enjoying a pleasant stint as a "house husband", listening to music and arranging the dry cleaning and doing the cooking — until his cat goes missing, his wife becomes distant and begins acting strangely, and he star ... (read full critics)

    dannyreviews published on Thu, 26 Aug 2010

9 Reviews

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  • 6 people find this helpful

    One of my favorites.

    One of the five or ten best novels I've ever read. It's a dreamlike mystery wrapped in a philosophical novel, although that doesn't even begin to describe it.

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    keithlaw said on Sep 12, 2006 about the Paperback edition | Add your feedback

  • 1 person find this helpful

    When I start reading a new Murakami book, I always have that moment of incredulity towards the characters - 'oh, they would never do / say / put up with that'.

    But after a while, I remember why I love his writing - very precise, very imaginative; so much so, you are completely reeled in thinking t ... (continue)

    When I start reading a new Murakami book, I always have that moment of incredulity towards the characters - 'oh, they would never do / say / put up with that'.

    But after a while, I remember why I love his writing - very precise, very imaginative; so much so, you are completely reeled in thinking that of course, why *wouldn't* they do / say / put up with that?'

    The beauty of this writing is it transports you to a new reality - this is kind of the point of a good book, no? :)

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    goldtop said on Jan 22, 2011 about the Paperback edition | Add your feedback

  • 1 person find this helpful

    Rationally: too long, too weird, too meandering, lots of stuff I read before (spaghetti, jazz, cats, strange women), but hey, this is the longest Murakami there is and I enjoyed every page I finished and every page I still had coming.

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    Sengaia said on Apr 27, 2009 about the Paperback edition | Add your feedback

  • *** This comment contains spoilers! ***

    Confusing but brilliant

    Loved being lost between different story lines. Enjoyed the rapid shift between the moods. I am going to find the rest of his works. He is a modern Bolkakov

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    Wagih2000 said on May 3, 2011 about the Paperback edition | Add your feedback

  • Bedazzled

    This book confirmed my conversion to Murakamism ;) I'd read Kafka on the Shore and been very impressed, then After Dark which... well, I may have to re-visit someday. Wind Up Bird Chronicle simply poured out good writing, moving gracefully between several plot lines before tying them all up mostly s ... (continue)

    This book confirmed my conversion to Murakamism ;) I'd read Kafka on the Shore and been very impressed, then After Dark which... well, I may have to re-visit someday. Wind Up Bird Chronicle simply poured out good writing, moving gracefully between several plot lines before tying them all up mostly satisfactorily, at the conclusion. I think this is probably his pinnacle, but I might be wrong:)

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    mrpeterryan said on Jan 10, 2010 about the Paperback edition | Add your feedback

Book Details

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ISBN Edition List Sale Seller
9789626344187 Audio CD $199.98 $179.98 bn.com
$115.98 $86.95 The Book Depository
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