A flippant part of me wants to say ‘thank the gods that’s over and done with’ because frankly parts of this trilogy (and Book 3 is no exception) were tedious. However that’s not the whole story and I need to counter my flippancy and say that the third book was better than the second and wrapped up most of the story points satisfactorily.
I say ‘most’ – my hunger to know more about the mysterious ‘little people’ wasn’t really satisfied and instead Murakami leant towards rounding off the ‘love story’ elements of the tale.
This trilogy started off with great promise and then faded away to become rather a disappointed read for this Murakami fan; and believe me I have read and enjoyed all his other books. I am also a big fan of George Orwell and I fail to see how this trilogy can be accurately described as a ‘mind-bending ode to George Orwell’s nineteen Eighty-Four.’
If I was to be unkind I would say it was ‘mind-numbing’ with way too much time spent describe mundane everyday matters, repetitive sections of unnecessary exposition and a disregard for the reader’s impatience and appetite for something of more than minor significance to happen. In fact at one point I recall saying to Siggy ‘oh, something’s finally happened.’
One might suggest my diet of the cut down bare-bones writing of PKD and Ian Fleming have tainted my palate against more literary works, but don’t forget that I am reading another trilogy (that of Gormenghast) and wolfing down every last morsel of overblown wordage with glee.
No. I know I am in danger of repetition myself, but Murakami is guilty of writing too much and I fear that as his reputation has grown so has the reluctance of any editor to suggest that he loses some verbosity where it simply adds nothing to the story.
couchmagpie 