After Dark

Fascinating read detailing a variety of encounters and situations occurring deep into the night of Tokyo, Japan. Rich emphasis towards long, drawn-out and worthwhile conversations with strangers, while still being sprinkled with surrealist ideas courtesy of Murakami’s signature style, this was pretty decent overall.

The best part of this book is easily the dialogue between its cast, and how you get to know more about them through these interactions that are very long yet flow pretty smoothly. Absolutely adored every second of Mari and Takahashi just talking about their experiences in life and I could read through their conversations all day.

It wouldn’t be Murakami without magical realism and surrealist ideas thrown into the mix, and the part where the point of view switches to an omniscient narrator was a bit of a mixed bag. Murakami’s prose and imagery shines through this section but it took a while for me to click what most of it meant and its purpose in shaping the story.

Maybe I’ll revisit this one some other time but for now this remains the weakest (still good!) novel I’ve read from him.