Staff Pick
About as introspective as a novel can be, Murakami's latest spends its entirety inside the somewhat sad mind of its protagonist. Damaged by a betrayal he cannot comprehend, Tsukuru is a man wholly undone by his closest friends. After years of loneliness, and only after stumbling into a new relationship with a woman who insists on his complete presence, Tsukuru realizes he must unravel his tangled past. Hoping for a new life of connections and companionship, Tsukuru tracks down his former friends and is, perhaps, a bit more kind than they deserve. Murakami writes with crisp, clear prose, and his characters feel wonderfully alive. A detailed character study, Colorless Tsukuru and His Years of Pilgrimage is delicately done; a lovely read. Recommended By Dianah H., Powells.com
Synopses & Reviews
A
New York Times #1 Bestseller
Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and His Years of Pilgrimage is the long-awaited new novel — a book that sold more than a million copies the first week it went on sale in Japan — from the award-winning, internationally best-selling author Haruki Murakami.
Here he gives us the remarkable story of Tsukuru Tazaki, a young man haunted by a great loss; of dreams and nightmares that have unintended consequences for the world around us; and of a journey into the past that is necessary to mend the present. It is a story of love, friendship, and heartbreak for the ages.
Review
[Colorless Tsukuru] is a book for both the new and experienced reader....The book reveals another side of Murakami, one not so easy to pin down. Incurably restive, ambiguous and valiantly struggling toward a new level of maturation....[The book’s] realism is tinged with the parallel worlds of 1Q84, particularly through dreams. The novel contains a fragility that can be found in Kafka on the Shore, with its infinite regard for music. Hardly a soul writes of the listening and playing of music with such insight and tenderness.” Patti Smith, The New York Times Book Review (cover review)
Review
"A page-turner with intervals of lapidary prose and dazzling human comprehension.” The Washington Post
Review
"There is a rawness, a vulnerability, to these characters, a sense that the surface of the world is thin, and the border between inner and outer life, between existence as we know it and something far more elusive, is easily effaced.” David L. Ulin, Los Angeles Times
Review
Readers find themselves propelled along by the ebb and flow of an internal logic that feels as much like a musical progression as it does an unfolding of events. The steady calm of the prose, the ambient rhythms of recurring motifs like Fraz Liszt's ‘Le Mal du Pays,’ and the close attention to repetitive patterns in characters' lives bring readers into a carefully measured cadence like that of Tsukuru's pared-down lifestyle....Thanks to Philip Gabriel's discerning translation into subtle yet artful language, the novel[‘s]...ease and obviousness convey an internal complexity that you ‘get’ without realizing it.” San Francisco Chronicle
Review
"Tsukuru's pilgrimage will never end, because he is moving constantly away from his destination, which is his old self. This is a narrow poignancy, but a powerful one, and Murakami is its master. Perhaps that's why he has come to speak not just for his thwarted nation, but for so many of us who love art — since it's only there, alas, in novels such as this one, that we're allowed to live twice.” Chicago Tribune
Review
"[Kafka] haunts Murakami's fiction as both an explicit presence...and a general tutelary influence....[Colorless Tsukuru is] as adept as ever at setting up Kafkaesque ambiguity and atmosphere.” The Guardian (UK)
Review
“Hypnotically fascinating....A journey of immense magnitude, both physically...and, of course, metaphysically, as Tazaki attempts to make sense of his own inner world and the dreams that shape his other dimension. There are always other dimensions in Murakami’s novels, and while they can seem impenetrable, they eventually feed into and help vivify the powerful personal dramas taking place on a purely human level. In the end, Murakami writes love stories, all the more tender and often tragic for their exploration of the multiple realities in which is lovers live.” Booklist (starred review)
Review
“Murakami devotees will sigh with relief at finding his usual memes – the moon, Cutty Sark, a musical theme, ringing telephones, a surreal story-within-a story (this time about passing on death and possibly six fingers). That the novel sold over one million copies its first week in Japan guarantees — absolutely, deservedly so — instant best-seller status stateside as well.” Library Journal (starred review)
Review
“One of Murakami’s more memorable protagonists...a testament to the mystery, magic, and mastery of this much-revered Japanese writer’s imaginative powers. Murakami’s moxie is characterized by a brilliant detective-story-like blend of intuition, hard-nosed logic, impeccable pacing, and poetic revelations....[He] reveals Tazaki’s pilgrimage through stunning psychologically and philosophically charged passages that are alternately all too real and almost hallucinatory...Tazaki’s quest restores him to the cycle of love, loss, and resurrection that is time’s eternal flow in surprising, delightful, and sometimes frightening ways, none of which will be lost on lucky readers of this new masterpiece.” Elle
Review
“A return to the mood and subject matter of the acclaimed writer’s earlier work....A vintage Murakami struggle of coming to terms with buried emotions and missed opportunities, in which intentions and pent up desires can seemingly transcend time and space to bring both solace and desolation.” Publishers Weekly (starred review)
Review
"The reader will enjoy watching Murakami play with color symbolism down to the very last line of the story, even as Tsukuru sinks deeper into a dangerous enigma....A trademark story that blends the commonplace with the nightmarish in a Japan full of hollow men.” Kirkus (starred review)
About the Author
Haruki Murakami was born in Kyoto in 1949 and now lives near Tokyo. His work has been translated into more than fifty languages. The most recent of his many international honors is the Jerusalem Prize, whose previous recipients include J. M. Coetzee, Milan Kundera, and V. S. Naipaul. Translated by Philip Gabriel.