Books to Read Poster No 53

 

Yes. oddly enough, it is the other Murakami. I wouldn't necessarily have chosen to read them one after the other (in poster terms) but it seems I reserved this one at the library at the same time as Norwegian Wood but it took them a lot longer to track down. 

(I should say as well as single books I am ploughing my way through a multi book series from the poster so doing a little better than it might seem.)

I really don't know where to start with this one as it is so very odd. It's much more entertaining than Norwegian Wood though, so that's a good start. It's a surreal story which sends the narrator ( middling successful, younger end of middle aged, recently divorced, Tokyo business man ) on a strange journey to Hokkaido to look for a missing friend and a sheep with a star mark on its fleece. It's all to do with a sheep that wants to take over the world and features an appearance from a man who dresses as a sheep to avoid being sent to war. There's a suicide, and a murder, and a woman with the most beautiful ears in the world. 

It's highly symbolic and even I, who know less than nothing really about Japan, caught some of the subtext and it was nice to have a subtext because goodness knows Norwegian Wood didn't have one, unless it was that life is bewildering or damaging or both and possibly not worth it. 

I didn't expect to say this, but I actually enjoyed this book, and I would recommend it, if only because it is probably unlike anything you have ever read before. 

The blog is now going silent for a wee while. Tonight we sleep on a boat, tomorrow we go to Glasgow for  a very very  packed two days before getting up at daft o'clock on Friday morning to fly to Stockholm where we will be for a week. Back in Orkney on 9th, back blogging, possibly on the 10th.