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3.76 AVERAGE
3.76 AVERAGE
emotional
mysterious
reflective
sad
slow-paced
Ok so this book, it just wasn't it. Reading it was a chore, and every five pages or so I would come across something - a detail or a weird description of some event - and just get bothered. So these were the things I didn't like about Haruki Murakami's Killing Commendatore.
1) Why? Why did he have to vividly describe him raping his own wife in his dreams?? I mean??? Of course it might be important to the story but why did he have to enjoy it??
2) Why did the main character have such a great visual memory throughout the novel, but wad he not able to remember things if that fit the story?? Also why was he ascriben (if that's a correct way of saying it) all these great superhuman traits but then kept on adressing himself as this super average guy?
3) This matches with 1 but omg he should SHUT UP about his dead sister when talking about sex/romance with other women. Sure Murakami didn't mean to make it seem like he was in love with his own sister, but it did seem that way (and it was not great at all to read as one can imagine).
4) Why did the last 100 pages exist?? They were useless and boring.
5) Idea's and Metaphors? Seriously? Was that supposed to be deep and insightful? It was weird, abstract and mostly very contradictory to literally everything in the story.
6) Omg all of these existential questions in the book. Why? Were they supposed to be #deep or something?
7) Mariye’s obsession with her boobs??????? Big no. Also she should learn to not share that info with an almost forty-year-old who is in love with his sister and fantasizes about raping his wife.
8) The whole artist thing was SO unrealistic I can go on for hours but let’s just keep it at this: it was bad.
9) The story was predictable. The times that it wasn’t were only so because the story was to weird to predict (I’ll say it again: Idea’s and Metaphors??).
10) Menshiki stalking his “daughter” and doing her mother figure. Gross.
11) This entire deep thing about his daughter being his etc. why? The parallel between him and Menshiki was so obvious and unnecessary.
12) Why is he such an expert on everything? Who cares about the cars? Why did Mariye know all these musicians in the end? This matches with 2 but it just bothered me that everyone was dumb/genius at different times solely for the plot to continue smoothly.
Ok well those were a couple things that bothered me. I read the translation so I won’t judge the writing. 2,5 stars for me, also because the story did progress etc. and I liked the pacing. The rest was just off. This is my opinion of course so yeah.
1) Why? Why did he have to vividly describe him raping his own wife in his dreams?? I mean??? Of course it might be important to the story but why did he have to enjoy it??
2) Why did the main character have such a great visual memory throughout the novel, but wad he not able to remember things if that fit the story?? Also why was he ascriben (if that's a correct way of saying it) all these great superhuman traits but then kept on adressing himself as this super average guy?
3) This matches with 1 but omg he should SHUT UP about his dead sister when talking about sex/romance with other women. Sure Murakami didn't mean to make it seem like he was in love with his own sister, but it did seem that way (and it was not great at all to read as one can imagine).
4) Why did the last 100 pages exist?? They were useless and boring.
5) Idea's and Metaphors? Seriously? Was that supposed to be deep and insightful? It was weird, abstract and mostly very contradictory to literally everything in the story.
6) Omg all of these existential questions in the book. Why? Were they supposed to be #deep or something?
7) Mariye’s obsession with her boobs??????? Big no. Also she should learn to not share that info with an almost forty-year-old who is in love with his sister and fantasizes about raping his wife.
8) The whole artist thing was SO unrealistic I can go on for hours but let’s just keep it at this: it was bad.
9) The story was predictable. The times that it wasn’t were only so because the story was to weird to predict (I’ll say it again: Idea’s and Metaphors??).
10) Menshiki stalking his “daughter” and doing her mother figure. Gross.
11) This entire deep thing about his daughter being his etc. why? The parallel between him and Menshiki was so obvious and unnecessary.
12) Why is he such an expert on everything? Who cares about the cars? Why did Mariye know all these musicians in the end? This matches with 2 but it just bothered me that everyone was dumb/genius at different times solely for the plot to continue smoothly.
Ok well those were a couple things that bothered me. I read the translation so I won’t judge the writing. 2,5 stars for me, also because the story did progress etc. and I liked the pacing. The rest was just off. This is my opinion of course so yeah.
A disturbing number of references to breasts, cats in cameo roles and psychedelic reveries (and realities) — Killing Commandatore is without doubt a Murakami novel. The narrator, a painter in his thirties seemingly disconnected from the social world yet in touch with art, music and literature, quite easily joins the genealogy of this writer’s characters. But while these classic pointers exist, accompanied with the celebrated Japanese author’s signature surreal existentialism, this novel ultimately fails to stand at par with his other works. In the end, the “naturalness” with which Murakami writes unnaturalness is bogged down by unnecessary repetitions, convoluted narrative lines and unsatisfactory endings.
https://theasianreader.home.blog/2019/06/25/killing-commendatore-by-haruki-murakami/
https://theasianreader.home.blog/2019/06/25/killing-commendatore-by-haruki-murakami/
adventurous
mysterious
fast-paced
I'm always after with the experience of reading Murakami's works--his words, his style, his characters, and the themes that ties it altogether. It's like a personal journey along with the narrator or main character. True, some its elements are a repetition of what's already in his other works, but that subconscious connection and peace I could only call "solitude" is what I always achieve after reading him. You can say it's a personal affair.
challenging
dark
emotional
inspiring
mysterious
reflective
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
dark
mysterious
reflective
relaxing
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Visceral and fantastically visual. The slow creep of the fantastical is always a strength of Murakami and it is especially true in this case.
Killing Commendatore by Haruki Murakami is part ghost story, part art-history lesson and part philosophy treatise. Weird, in a David Lynch kind of way. Very entertaining. Click below for my full review.
https://youtu.be/cZc0xYPYnM0
https://youtu.be/cZc0xYPYnM0