Norwegian Wood

Not my favourite

This is not my favourite novel by Haruki Murakami, but I still enjoyed it. I don`t think it is as great as The Wind-up Bird Chronicle, for instance, but the slow pace of this novel, the dreaminess is great, the characters are very true, very real. It is essentially the story of first and second love and how we open our hearts to another human being, by sometimes risking all that we have.
Apparently this is the book that made Murakami famous in the Western world, which I find strange, not because the book is bad, no - it is a great book. But this novel is actually rather different from his other works.
I heartily recommend it, but also to read other books from the same author, because they are different.

3 out of 3 people found this review helpful.

Amazing!!

A love story like no other, but then again, it's not really like any other love story around. It brings to question as to what love is, what do we consider love to be and what exactly are we looking for when we are in love? This book helps bring back an individual who has suffered from a servere break-up or current divorce because it gives the reader a chance to find himself again, and in some case closure or peace of mind. If you're looking to bounce back from depression and enjoy yourself and your own life, I highly recommend this book!!

2 out of 2 people found this review helpful.

Different

For a Murakami novel, Norwegian Wood was really different. It did not involve someone running away or going missing and it didn't have many crazy things going on. It was a more cohesive story than most of his other books.

1 out of 1 people found this review helpful.

Heartbreakingly real

A not-so-simple story about a doomed love affair. A coming-of-age kind of story. Oddly, some of the construction reminds me of Chaucer's 'A Knight's Tale.' Very interesting, that. Anyway, he's a master at characterization. Sometimes I had to step outside of the novel just to marvel at his technique. Sometimes he reminds me of Lorrie Moore, in the way that he makes observations that hit you, bam, in the solar plexus, making you understand certain truths you hadn't understood before. Or, things you'd never verbalized, even internally. Yes. It's so, so good. Maybe a little melodramatic at times (death, death, death), but if a novelist is supposed to help us understand life, well. Yes.

1 out of 1 people found this review helpful.

An outstanding piece of literature

This book will not only captivate you, but change the way you look at the world. There are not enough stars to give this novel.

1 out of 1 people found this review helpful.

Camu Translates Catcher in the Rye

A modern moving masterpiece. Haruki captures the pulse of true existentialism in the voice of an adolescent. A treasure to store in one's memory.

1 out of 2 people found this review helpful.

Modern masterpiece

Before its U.S. publication, I had only heard about how wonderful Haruki's first novel was. I knew that it was the novel that broke sales records in Japan and established him as a premier author who not only appealed to a small cult following, but also was admired by readers around the world. I was excited to finally be able to get my hands on a copy that was not a 500 dollar collector's item. This novel was AMAZING! A simple plot line, realistic characters, and clear, descriptive writing throughout. A must read!

1 out of 1 people found this review helpful.

Not out of the woods

I read this book in two different languages, it was still boring both times. Don't get the point of the story or the raving reviews.

Rosemarie

Am i welcome in ur clan?

Woodclan territory

Nursery

A Readable, Intensely Individual Book

Nor­we­gian Wood by Haruki Murakami is a fic­tional1987 novel set in 1960s Tokyo, Japan. The novel became pop­u­lar with Japan­ese youth and pro­pelled Murakami to new heights of fame.

Toru Watan­abe rem­i­nisces about his days as a col­lege stu­dent in 1960s Tokyo. At the time Watan­abe devel­oped strong rela­tion­ships with two women whose per­son­al­i­ties are oppo­site of one another. Naoko is beau­ti­ful yet trou­bled while Midori is out­go­ing and lively.

Nor­we­gian Wood by Haruki Murakami is a mem­o­rable story, yet sim­ple and unas­sum­ing. Patience seemed to be the main theme as it seems the nar­ra­tor, Toru Watan­abe, waits for a woman to return his love.

Unlike Murakami other books, this one lacks the super­nat­ural over a more prac­ti­cal themes such as choos­ing a real­is­tic part­ner over a lost fan­tasy. Watan­abe copes with loss through­out the book and the tale, told in flash­backs, is mostly how he copes with them.

The char­ac­ters are well defined and real­is­tic while they bat­tle tragedy tossed at them at every turn by Murakami. They have roman­tic inspi­ra­tions and rejec­tions, strug­gle with depres­sion and flawed. There are many ref­er­ences to dead or dying char­ac­ters for a short book such as this.

While many of the pages are gloomy, many oth­ers are filled with hope and humor. If I had to use word to describe this novel I would choose “authen­tic” as the book feels fresh and non-conventional. It is beyond me how the author man­aged to cre­ate such a unique atmos­phere while writ­ing, it cer­tainly came across to me as a reader – and of a trans­lated work nonetheless.

This is a read­able book, intensely indi­vid­ual and from my under­stand­ing an ear­lier trans­la­tion was used by school chil­dren in Japan to learn Eng­lish. I found that a bit amus­ing since the book includes mas­tur­ba­tion, drunk­en­ness, promis­cu­ity, mas­tur­ba­tion, molesta­tion, men­tal ill­ness, sui­cide and more.

This is before I learned that the book was banned in the US.

Great read, but not for the casual reader

Sex, love, and neuroses. What more could anyone ask of a novel? Of course, that IS a gross simplification of a novel which presents some fairly complex themes, such as love, identity, duty, and many others. If one is looking for a read with some texture and depth, look no further. However, if one is looking for an easily digestible, pulp fiction read, he should probably look elsewhere.

Amazing

Murakami's best book and I don' say that lightly. One of me new favorite novels

WOW

This is an amazing book,worth reading!!

Pointless

Sad, pointless, feeble female characters, overrated.

0 out of 2 people found this review helpful.

Masterfully Written Coming of Age Story

This has been called Murakami's most autobiographical novel and different in style then his other books. One thing is for sure, Murakami is a highly skilled writer. His coming of age story may not be the most original plot, but I have never read a story with more distict and interesting characters and rarely such an easy flowing prose style. About 2/3rds of the way through this book I considered it a very well written coming of age/romantic novel but by the end it was one of my favorite contemporary novels. The ending is amazing and interesting. Being set in the late 1960's with college-aged characters The Beatles and sexuality play major roles.

Read my review here

http://bookjacketreviews.blogspot.com/2009_12_01_archive.html

0 out of 3 people found this review helpful.

A reviewer

This book was very, very disappointing. It did not live up to the hype. It was boring and random and came off as a sob story rather than the 'coming of age' novel that every one else is calling it. Stick to Catcher in the Rye.

0 out of 1 people found this review helpful.

Read in one breath

Life story, easy to read and takes your breath away. Once you start, you can't stop.

Norwegian Wood

This book was so hard to put down. It kept me wanting more. The characters were so real. The ending definitely made me wonder what happened to Toru. I absolutely love this book and would recommend it to anyone. It has a little bit of everything.