Haruki Murakami: Where to Begin? 5 Best Bets to Start

Where to begin ? It's not like with Salinger where the answer would of course be The Catcher in the Rye (with the critical addition of not letting the reader stop there, forcing them on to the "Nine Stories" of course and then "Franny and Zooey" and last but certainly not least "Raise High the Roof Beam, Carpenters - bar none the least inviting title to a fucking brilliant story.) With Murakami it depends on the person reading. Is this reader a lovelorn romantic, or more the type to need a meaty, weighty book? Do fantasy and wonder appeal? Or is it just a straight but rather surreal adventure that is the order of the day?

The following is an attempt to help solve the problem:

Norwegian Wood
--For melancholy love and what seems so simple a story, but that carriers a similar mystique magic to J.D. Salinger's The Catcher in the Rye

Hard Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World
--For the adult reader who doesn't believe there are fantasy books for adults, books that can take you into your imagination the way they did when you were a kid, but that are actually written for people who've outgrown George Lucas (more or less).

Dance, Dance, Dance
--For the utter fun pleasure of a magical mystery kind of tour - this is a thrill ride for the literary reader. [For a wee review follow me.]


The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle
--For what many consider to be his first masterpiece, and what I have to call the best opening to a book I can think of.

Kafka on the Shore
--To confuse everything this may well be my favourite Murakami book of all, but it comes last and gets no real descriptor because I don't think it's the way to start if you're not familiar with the author. Start with the very good, warm your way to the great.

Sorries (and a book recommendation for Lloyd Jones' "Mr. Pip")

Sorry that I haven't posted in some time. That I don't always know how I should/can feed this beast. To find its place. What is this thing? This blog? I'm not always sure. It's not a journal, I know, because I keep a journal, and much of my journaling is pretty embarrassingly boring. Of late a whole lot of self-talk, organizing, theorizing, deciding, self-motivating, analyzing, moaning bitching whining and then self-motivating to organize and get started all over again. Very little dirty dark secret stuff in the Japanese notebooks my darling mother-in-law sends from Japan (cause they're sooo much better, and soo much cheaper than the crap we get in Canada). Maybe that's because it's not that kind of journal, hasn't been for years (if ever, really). Perhaps the dirty dark secrets stay in my head or go in little pffts out there into the ether in conversation with this friend and that, or into my work - where I try to channel most of everything these days.

Sometimes I use this place to offer recommendations. Speaking of, have you read "Mr. Pip?" Go away to an island, a place of myth based on real. A fable story that has a "Little Prince" ability, a Murakami ability to get your imagination flowing but is also political without being big P political. I.e. Interesting, but still fiction story stunning. That magic that was the transporting reason you went to books as a kid. That kind of book. But for grownups.

Sorry because I'm tired, and who isn't. Some big deadlines keeping me busy, out of trouble, but also offline.

Sorry that I have yet to decide what exactly I want to do here. I want to post more stories, when the time allows. I want to add books for the desert island list (perhaps a movie or two). I want so many things. For now, though, I take it slow.

At the risk of being overly diary-like, I haven't finished the novel first draft (because other deadlines loomed, because I've never done anything of this size, magnitude before (I did write a first draft attempt at a novel my first time out in Japan; but that wasn't something that anyone was ever going to see) and how the hell am I supposed to know how long it'll take). Either way, after three weeks of other work that sidetracked me completely, am now ready to get back in. I was going to choose the verb dive, but I'm not diving. Instead this morning, I didn't even dip my foot from above to test the water temp, choosing, rather, to pay bills and eat cashews and file papers that hadn't been filed in months. Paper filing - so romantic. Cashews - so delicious, when salted.

So now a little freed up, and journal like in this entry, I take stock. It is June 25th. I'm 33 years old. The lunchtime thunderstorm outside has just abated so I guess I'll go eat lunch. After that, lug the old oji-san (the grandpa) of a laptop off to the local cafe (you know the franchise) and maybe finish the fucking thing.

Till next time, adieu.

A Favourite Place in the World

It takes about 10 minutes to walk from Spadina to Bathurst along the stretch of Bloor Street Torontonians know as The Annex. A quick mental checklist of its restaurants includes at least three English-style pubs, no less than four places for sushi, three places for Thai, two Indian places across the street from each other, both with lunch buffets for $8.95. There is a chain chicken wing place that looks brand name terrible but is the real deal (a fantastic hot sauce). Better still is Sarah's Shwarma, the narrow grungy place next to Future's Bakery, the all-night cafe/restaurant with the large patio and the always unhappy wait staff. There is another shwarma/falafel place next to The Bloor Cinema (we call it The Bloor), the old repertory theatre that still plays cool things like "2001" every once in a while but never gets enough bums in seats. The shwarma place next to The Bloor gets more business than Sarah's on account of their door is always open, even in frigid February, and the smell hits you good. Still Sarah's is better. Don't let the smells fool you.

The Annex is a cafe crowd community. There must be at least ten places to get tea or coffee, chain places and local places that have been there for decades, a new place with wood floors and much space that specializes in tea, another called Aroma that gives you a free little chocolate with your coffee (like a pillow treat, but on your saucer, a saucer treat, then - one of those 'why didn't I think of that' ideas). There are shops to buy futons and shops to buy posters. There are upstairs yoga places and places to do Pilates. Lee's Palace with its colourful cartoon mural on the brick outside is a great not so little music venue.

The Annex is filled with used book shops and great new book shops and Queen Video, the kind of organized by director video store that makes you want to throw old popcorn at Blockbuster and its nothing but The Latest Hits collection.

The Annex is the kind of multicultural dream that Pierre Trudeau might have had, where mixed couples, of colour, of race, of religion, of gender, where all these pairs can walk hand-in-hand without thought that this thing is still new to the world. How Chinese customers can order sushi from Korean-run places with Japanese names, or how a South African Jew can eat a Syrian shwarma served by a university student from Afghanistan.

This is the mixed race, arty-farty, academic, relaxed, not overly fashionable perfect part of town you go to on a dusky June evening for an ice cream at that ice cream stand place across from the Bruni, the cheesy bar no one goes to unless they are a first year student at U of T. A part of town where those same prep students might dress down to busk and loiter on corners with their guitars, sitting themselves down on sidewalk by homeless men and young women often begging with their sleepy dogs. The kind of place where hippie is still trendy and women often go braless in loose shirts they wear over long summer skirts.

This is, in other words, my favourite place in Toronto, one of my most favourite places in the world.

Writerly Quote of the Month

"There are three rules for writing a novel. Unfortunately no one knows what they are."
-Somerset Maugham

[pictured: Haruki Murakami]

The Best Show on TV

Funny how we have to go back to fiction to get in touch with reality.

Glories

THE BEST EVER!

Ralph Fiennes in "The Constant Gardener" - Just a Great Move

Hoping you saw this spectacular film (story, acting, music, photography, mood, I could go on), I wonder if you sat through the credits? You may have missed this quote by the author (an ex-secret service agent) of the novel the film was based on, slipped in after the music credits have rolled by.

NOBODY IN THIS STORY, AND NO OUTFIT OR CORPORATION, THANK GOD, IS BASED UPON AN ACTUAL PERSON OR OUTFIT IN THE REAL WORLD. BUT I CAN TELL YOU THIS, AS MY JOURNEY THROUGH THE PHARMACEUTICAL JUNGLE PROGRESSED, I CAME TO REALIZE THAT, BY COMPARISON WITH THE REALITY, MY STORY WAS AS TAME AS A HOLIDAY POSTCARD.
-John Le Carre

Still Too Cool for Shorts, But Lovely Nevertheless

When sitting down for a late dinner at 8pm and the sunshine is still streaming bright through your kitchen window, striping the spice rack with its rays, you know it's almost summer in Canada.