UNFINISHED READING - The City & It's Uncertain Walls by Haruki Murakami

I first read Murakami's Wind Up Bird Chronicle many years ago. And nothing I've read by him since has attained quite the same level of sheer inventiveness and batty bizarreness of that novel. IQ84, for all its voluminous length, proved a lot more satisfying to read than I expected.  His collections of short stories First Person Singular and Men Without Women had moments that were good. One of his best books remains Underworld, an exploration of Japanese culture in relation to the religious cult behind the Sarin attack, which is a superb piece of disturbing analysis. But that was resolutely a non fiction event. One suspects that the quality of Murakami's literary fiction has been erratic for a while. He maintains to this day a huge output. The experience of reading The City & It's Uncertain Walls makes me think that maybe he should do less, go out running more, anything other than write another novel with not a lot too it.

This novel begins with a simple love affair between a teenage boy and girl. They dedicate their lives to each other. But she starts to spend time in another town and they seem to be drifting apart. In order to be close to her he moves there, but finds it's a place where there are no shadows, you have to forsake them if you want to stay their for long. The boy finds his girlfriend who doesn't really remember him. He takes work in the library as a Dream Reader in order to be near her. 

By this time I am ninety pages into a 400+ page novel and not a lot of real consequence has happened. The idea of a place where shadows are forsaken feels very 'Murakami Lite' to me.The sort of thing one of his many Japanese copy cat imitators would write. I've been waiting to be picked up and captivated by the arc of a story developing, and it's just not happening. In the past I would have stuck this out just in case it does finally all come together. But you know, I cannot be arsed to do that. l'm of the view these days, that life is just too short to persist with a novel you are developing no affection for. If it really doesn't hold any interest for you, feel free to move on. So I have.

CARROT REVIEW - 2/8