1Q84 - Haruki Murakami

1Q84 is the first book I have experienced by Haruki Murakami. I say experienced, rather than read, because I listened to the audio book version after seeing the title on the Audible.com tournament of books. A little research showed me that Murakami is a well known Japanese author.

The book is very long. I listened to a large portion of the story on a three day motorcycle trip through Colorado. The trip and the book were full of wonder.Though I found myself thinking the book does not need to be this long, I was drawn through the entire story by my interest in the characters, who seemed very life like--probably due to the exhaustive detail of their every movement but also because I understood and cared about their wants and needs.

The book was made longer because a third point of view was added late in the book. This character then investigated and slowly revealed what we (the readers) had already seen the two main characters do. That said, this third POV character
was, or had the potential to be, my favorite protagonist / antagonist.

Murakami spent a lot of time describing nudity and sex that was not strictly necessary to advance the story, but was a lot of fun and full of great visuals. Still it did add to the prodigious length of the novel. Murakami writes with great style and understands how to create tension. That, in my opinion, is great fiction.

I would recommend this novel to people who read fast or are looking to spend a lot of time with it. I googled musical composers, literary authors, and geography many times as I listened, which was rewarding. I did enjoy 1Q84.