Just a couple of weeks into the new year, and I have finished reading my first book! South of the Border, West of the Sun
by Haruki Murakami has been sitting on my shelf for a long time now (the receipt I found in the book showed that I bought it at Borders 14 years ago!). Actually I sort of forgot about it, but when I started reading it I couldn’t put it down! That happens often when I read a book by Murakami.
I won’t go into the plot of the story, but the one thing that I kept thinking as I was reading it is that I really miss Japan. This is normal a normal reaction with all his books. But I always can picture the scenes, especially the ones in the city and I can remember when I stood in the same locations as his characters. At least the same neighborhoods.
Like most of Murakami’s works, there are many details that get left unsaid and unexplained. It’s fascinating to read about everyone’s theories about these loose ends. There’s a nice thread on Reddit if you’d like to read them.
I enjoyed South of the Border, West of the Sun quite a bit. I’m now ready to move on to his latest work, Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and His Years of Pilgrimage: A novel which I found at my local library’s digital catalog.
