Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and His Years of Pilgrimage

Tsukuru gets on with life

This was my third Murakami novel, prior to this I've read 1Q84 and The Wind Up Bird Chronicle. By the half way point I realised this book was very different from my previous experiences with Murakami, in that this is a fairly straight forward novel, where as both Wind Up Bird and 1Q84 are long, sprawling and surreal. There are still hints of the surreal here, but there is never any melding between the plot and fantasy as I've read in his other work.
The plot for Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and His Years of Pilgrimage is very simple - Tsukuru is a man nearing middle age who lives a solitary life when he starts dating a woman named Sarah. After getting together a few times, Tsukuru tells Sarah that he had once been part of a close group of 5 school friends, but as they approached adulthood, he was suddenly evicted from the group one day for no apparent reason. He becomes depressed and lives the rest of his life from this point almost friendless, working as a train station designer with a resigned acceptance of how things have turned out for him.
Sarah tells him that she doesn't want to continue the relationship until he deals with his past so she convinces him to go back and visit his old friends to find out why they had rejected him so suddenly and strongly. With this, Tsukuru sets off to talk to his old friends individually and finally learns why they had abandoned him.
Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and His Years of Pilgrimage is a meditative exploration of a man's loneliness, confusion and search for a spark to re-ignite his enthusiasm for life after the hurt of being abandoned so unfairly by his friends. Having read 2 Murakami books previously, I wasn't expecting an ending where everything or at least something ends up neatly resolved, but this comes close at least, and for that reason the ending is more satisfying than both Wind Up Bird and 1Q84.
I wasn't a fan of the narration - the "Britishness" and "properness" of it was a mistake - Murakami is a writer of quirkiness, and while the words and characters in the novel express that, the narration doesn't.

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A Great Bittersweet Story

This is my first Murakami book. There are people like Tsukuru in this world. People who are not colourful and popular but they bring meaning to others in interesting ways. I keep listening to this story over and over again. The pilgrimage can be dark and bittersweet but it has some measure of hope.

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Very good tale of abandonment

Great, unmagical tale meditating on the impact of being left alone. Didn't love the narrator as he was a bit dry but it didn't take away from the story. I can tell that objectively it isn't one of his best works but the themes and characters really stuck with me and it whizzes along. given the last Murakami I read was 1Q84 the brevity is a definite point in favour

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Murakami in contemplative mode

What made the experience of listening to Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and His Years of Pilgrimage the most enjoyable?

The wonder of living now is that Murakami is writing - and regardless of whether the books are big and strange, or small and eloquent, or small and decidedly weird, its a privilege. The narration of this is quite perfect - its a novel that has a quiet way of slipping in - and while it isn't my favourite Murakami (The Wind Up Bird Chronicle is flawless) is it still liqueur.

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