A Wild Sheep Chase by Haruki Murakami

Not too long ago I picked up Wind / Pinball by Haruki Murakami, but left unfinished. I guess I wasn't quite in the mood (I'm going to have to pick it up again soon seeing how Wind / Pinball are the preceding stories of A Wild Sheep Chase). And then about two days ago I decided to give this one a go and I was hooked right away! I suppose, I was in the mood this time.

Mood is of extreme importance when reading Haruki Murakami novels. Well, I might say that mood is important no matter what you are reading, be that a Haruki Murakami book or an RF Microelectronics book by Behzad Rezavi... in any case... this time the mood hit me and I cruised through this book. What did I think of it, you ask? Well, It was a good book. I particularly liked the main character (who is also part of Wind / Pinball I assume, but since I haven't read those two stories yet, I have no way knowing if this is indeed the same character). Anyhow, this guy was totally my type, and for the majority of the book, I enjoyed reading it so much because I liked this character. The rest of it... the rest of the characters and the story were fairly simple, and uninteresting. It was entertaining, don't get me wrong, but not at a level I have come to expect from Haruki Murakami. Most likely because A Wild Sheep Chase is the very first novel that Murakami wrote. Wind and Pinball are more like short stories, or novellas, rather than novels, so that makes sense.

That said, it did have a very typical Murakami vibe going on, albeit a much watered down version of Murakami. There was a cat, there was something... or someone, that wasn't exactly a living, breathing human being, there was a mysterious girl, and the main dude was quite charming! And then there was a sheep too! A talking sheep this time... although it appeared he did most of the talking in dreams.

Kafka on the Shore by Haruki Murakami

What makes one fall in love with a book? For me at least, it's when I can relate to the characters; when I get transported to the time and place the characters are living in. When the dialogues and narrations speak to me, and to my heart. Kafka on the Shore did all those things for me. It's a book that balances surrealism and reality perfectly, so much so that even the most bizarre things seem plausible in real life, or at least in some way they feel like metaphors. Which is just as well, because Murakami says in this book through Oshima (one of the characters): "Everything in life is a metaphor."

This is my first ever Murakami book. A co-worker suggested him to me so I picked up this book from the library. I can't remember what made me borrow this one out of the many others that my library carries of Murakami, but I'm sure glad that I picked this because I can tell, for a long time to come, this shall be one of my all time favorite books!

What I realized after reading this book is that Murakami understands the human mind very well; or at least he understands people like me. Throughout the whole book I felt part of the conversations between the characters. I felt as thought I was either one of the participants, or a bystander with a very good understanding of the people, in this case the characters, of a particular scenario that I happened to be reading. The backdrop for this book is contemporary Japan; but as I was reading, I felt that it could very well be the United States, or anywhere else in the world for that matter. I think it's safe to assume that Murakami can transcend time and place through his novels (or at least this novel because this is the only Murakami book I've read so far.)

White is for Witching by Helen Oyeyemi

Before I start with my review I would like to share why I picked up this book in the first place, a couple of days ago, even though it wasn't initially part of my March reading list. Well, lately I have been seeing a lot of buzz on the internet about a book called What's Not Yours Is Not Yours by an author whom I've never heard of before -- Helen Oyeyemi. I dug around a bit on Goodreads and didn't really know what to expect of her work; but I decided to check out a book from my library anyway. Why this particular book you ask? The cover, really. I fell in love with the cover art. All I can say is that I was not disappointed; not at all!

Now on to the review:

I started this book with no particular expectation. I read a few Goodreads reviews, but they didn't really give out much (and I am grateful for that!) Now, how or where do I even start? I would say that White is for Witching belongs to the Young Adult going into New Adult genre, mixed in with Fantasy, Weird, Eerie, Horror, Gothic, Tragedy, and so on and so forth. It's a little bit of anything and everything, packed tightly in a book that's not even 300 pages long. You'd think all these things would be too much for one book; but no! Heck no! This book was perfection; I wouldn't have it any other way whatsoever! That said, I realize that this book is not for everyone. Most people would either love it or hate it. As for me, if you haven't figured it out already, I loved it.

White is for Witching is a weird little story, and at the same time, it strikes a chord that anyone can recognize. Loss. Tragedy. Grief. Most of us have experienced it at one point or another, and if not quite yet, then will experience it. Have you seen the movie that came out towards the end of 2014, called The Babadook? Well, this book reminded me of that movie in some ways. In both, we see a grieving family trying to cope and live with their individual losses. Take The Babadook, add more, much more to it, and you may have a little bit of taste of White is for Witching. It's grimmer, sadder, eerier, weirder, scarier, darker, BETTER.