A review by tomstoneman
Kafka on the Shore by Haruki Murakami

adventurous dark mysterious reflective slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? No
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

1.5

This is the last time I’m going to say this is the last Murakami book I’m reading. You do not need to make every single character obsess over classical literature, western philosophy and Beethoven, it’s painfully pretentious mere name dropping references for the sake of it. Putting the strange incest and awful female characters aside, this one really just is bad. It tries to be philosophical and deep and meaningful which seems appealing at first and until you realise it’s just chatting absolute shit. I do think perhaps with these kinds of books it sounds beautiful in Japanese but the way he talks about metaphysical concepts and breaking boundaries of logic and reason sounds like it’s written by someone who reads philosophy in their own time Interpreting as their own but not having a clue about the arguments themselves. If you want to read Murakami just read After Dark and move on
Expand filter menu Content Warnings