This is a great book on many levels. The first of which is that it is a Japanese novel set in Japan written by a Japanese novelist that seems both Asian and Western at the same time. Brilliant. Unusual. This author is the Asian Gabriel Garcia Marquez. The man who can make the mystical qualities of his culture, a culture he clearly adores, understandable to those not in the know. Not Japanese. Not able to rift on the cultural norms that the book recapitulates. The second is that the story is wonderfully told. The protagonist, Toru Okada, is complicated. At first he seems kind of mild mannered and straight-forward, except that he has quit his job without a prospect for a new one. His wife seems devoted to him and unconcerned by his unemployment. First their cat disappears. Then his wife follows. The back story to all that is just as interesting as the story that is happening, and the story that is in Toru's dream life is yet another dimension to the tale. The helpers that step forward to aid him in the search for his cat are also a mixed bag--they give him information, helpful information, details that he didn't know--but not necessarily associated with the cat. But Toru never looks a gift horse in the mouth. One of the (for me) subtle part of the book is that the culture of shame is very much alive and well in Murakami's Japan, but it is more complicated. His characters are fully engaged in western culture, yet not quite dissociated from their Asian heritage. The story meanders between the main theme and the various side themes. It is difficult at times to tell what is really happening, what is a dream, what is part of the Tokyo underworld, and what falls in the realm of the mystical. But the book is always well written, always riveting, always entertaining.
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