The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle by Haruki Murakami My rating: 5 of 5 stars   I can understand readers having extreme love/hate reactions to Murakami, generally, and to The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle, particularly. As in his other works, the most recent of which is 1Q84, opening the covers of Wind-Up Bird is like strapping yourself into a carnival ride through someone else’s dream world; unless you are very keenly interested in the mind of that dreamer, you will be in turns bored or repelled by the experience. I am keenly interested in Murakami, and I find myself willing to read pretty much anything he writes; but it is a love that surpasses my own understanding at times.

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