Reading thread

[LonerMatt]

Finished Wind up Bird Chronicle - very formtative for Murakami (it seemed) and a bit less cohesive and cool.

Not disappointing, but not up to the standard of others, IMO.

Thoughts?

My Mum also asked me to read "A Visit from the Goon Squad" which was so overtly middle aged it was funny.

Next on the list: Gibsonx3.

 

[dan138zig]

stopped reading it halfway. wandered around too far to my liking.

 

[Superb0bo]

I finished it, but think it is among his weakest work, but with some great parts. Wild sheep chase + dance dance dance should be everyone's introduction to Murakami.

 

[LonerMatt]

Dance, dance, dance is my second favourite.

South of the Border, West of the Sun is just toooooooooooooooo ******* good.

 

[wogbog]

I'm reading Le compte de Monte Cristo right now. At 10 pages/day it will take me roughly forever.

 

[Nikos]

I finished it, but think it is among his weakest work, but with some great parts. Wild sheep chase + dance dance dance should be everyone's introduction to Murakami.

Dance, dance, dance is my second favourite.

South of the Border, West of the Sun is just toooooooooooooooo ******* good.

So which one should I go for after the Bird Chronicle and Norwegian Wood gents? I liked the Chronicle more.

 

[LonerMatt]

If you liked Chronicle, then go for 19Q4 which is, all round, doing what WUBC was trying to do but a lot better. Or Kafka on the Shore, or Dance, Dance, Dance.

NW and SOTBWOTS are more romantic, than the others.

 

[Superb0bo]

Kafka on the shore is really good, and combines the "weird" side (i.e. magic realism) with a strong plot.

But as I mentioned, "wild sheep chase" + "dance dance dance", where the latter is a sequel to the former, are among his best work.

 

[futuresailors]

I remember reading that NW was his attempt at a normal romance, which would explain why it's a bit atypical.
If you liked the Windup Bird more, 1Q84, Kafka on the Shore, or Hardboiled Wonderland would be up your alley.
Or if you like short stories, The Elephant also Vanishes collection.

 

[noob in 89]

No thoughts on Michael Cunningham! I don't believe it....

 

[ter1413]

Just started this:

 

[LonerMatt]

Neuromancer: I read this first when I was about 19. I remember being confused a lot by it and didn't really understand what was going on.

This time around, though, it rocked. The story is convoluted and complex, but it essentially follows a hacker called Case who is slowly dying in Chiba - a district of Japan. He is given a second life as long as he commits to an unexplained mission presented by an weird guy called Armitage. Along the way, the plot thickens as Case learns his job is to hack through a powerful AI, and that his real employer is a part of that AI called Wintermute.

Visionary and amazing. Still incredibly powerful.

I want to add to this and say that Gibson's prose is incredibly light (it's not labourious, and convoluted sentences using words particular to this novel just roll off the page), but simultaenously powerful and paced so well, an example:

"Cold steel ice odor. Ice caresses his spine.
Lost, so small amid that dark, hands grown col, body image fading down corridors of television sky.
Voices.
Then black fire found the branching tributaries of the nerves, pain beyond anything to which the name of pain is given..."

"The landscape of the northern Sprawl woke confused memories of childhood for Case, dead grass tufting the cracks in a canted slab of freeway concrete.

The train began to decelerate ten kilometers from the airport. Case watched the sun rise on the landscape of childhood, on broken slag and the rusted shells of refineries."

 

[eluther]



If you liked Chronicle, then go for 19Q4 which is, all round, doing what WUBC was trying to do but a lot better. Or Kafka on the Shore, or Dance, Dance, Dance.

NW and SOTBWOTS are more romantic, than the others.

I absolutely love Murakami, but 1Q84 was one of the worst thing I've ever read – I returned it to the book store after 100 pages. It's actually the only book I've ever returned. Most of the problems could be chocked up to poor translation, but I don't see how it could do what WUBC does unless something shifts dramatically.

I think Kafka on the Shore's a great second Murakami novel. It complements WUBC in a lot of ways, kind of like a companion EP to a longer LP.

 

[artishard116]

you messed up.

 

[futuresailors]

@eluther Did you not like it because it was bad or because it was overly "Murakami-y"? I wasn't blown away by it either, but that's because it felt like he was recycling tropes from his other stories.

@LonerMatt One of the Great works of the 20th century. It's too bad "sci-fi" is stigmatized as it is, Neuromancer probably the most insightful work regarding the development of modern culture around, right down to the formal elements of the prose; #twitter.