Norwegian Wood

Norwegian Wood

The average reader will spend 4 hours and 58 minutes reading this book at 250 WPM (words per minute).

Your speed

To find your reading speed you can take one of our WPM tests.

Sponsored Content

Book Info

Author

Haruki Murakami

Word Count

74,500 words

based on page count

Pages

298 pages

Edition Publisher

Vintage

Edition Publish Date

2000-09-12

Identifiers

ISBN-10: 0375704027

ISBN-13: 9780375704024

Description

First American Publication

This stunning and elegiac novel by the author of the internationally acclaimed Wind-Up Bird Chronicle has sold over 4 million copies in Japan and is now available to American audiences for the first time.  It is sure to be a literary event.

Toru, a quiet and preternaturally serious young college student in Tokyo, is devoted to Naoko, a beautiful and introspective young woman, but their mutual passion is marked by the tragic death of their best friend years before.  Toru begins to adapt to campus life and the loneliness and isolation he faces there, but Naoko finds the pressures and responsibilities of life unbearable.  As she retreats further into her own world, Toru finds himself reaching out to others and drawn to a fiercely independent and sexually liberated young woman.

A poignant story of one college student's romantic coming-of-age, Norwegian Wood takes us to that distant place of a young man's first, hopeless, and heroic love.

Publishers Weekly

In a complete stylistic departure from his mysterious and surreal novels (The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle; A Wild Sheep Chase) that show the influences of Salinger, Fitzgerald and Tom Robbins, Murakami tells a bittersweet coming-of-age story, reminiscent of J.R. Salamanca's classic 1964 novel, Lilith--the tale of a young man's involvement with a schizophrenic girl. A successful, 37-year-old businessman, Toru Watanabe, hears a version of the Beatles' Norwegian Wood, and the music transports him back 18 years to his college days. His best friend, Kizuki, inexplicably commits suicide, after which Toru becomes first enamored, then involved with Kizuki's girlfriend, Naoko. But Naoko is a very troubled young woman; her brilliant older sister has also committed suicide, and though sweet and desperate for happiness, she often becomes untethered. She eventually enters a convalescent home for disturbed people, and when Toru visits her, he meets her roommate, an older musician named Reiko, who's had a long history of mental instability. The three become fast friends. Toru makes a commitment to Naoko, but back at college he encounters Midori, a vibrant, outgoing young woman. As he falls in love with her, Toru realizes he cannot continue his relationship with Naoko, whose sanity is fast deteriorating. Though the solution to his problem comes too easily, Murakami tells a subtle, charming, profound and very sexy story of young love bound for tragedy. Published in Japan in 1987, this novel proved a wild success there, selling four million copies. (Sept.) Copyright 2000 Cahners Business Information.|

View more on Amazon This link earns Reading Length a commission!

Results Powered By

Open Library
Amazon
Google Books

Sponsored Content


Made with ♥ in Boise by Bridger Putnam

Word count estimates are not guaranteed to be accurate. If you are an author of a book or know of a book's accurate wordcount, contact me.

As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases. Commissions help keep this site afloat, but please consider supporting your local bookstore or library.

Amazon and the Amazon logo are trademarks of Amazon.com, Inc. or its affiliates.

Privacy Policy | Terms and Conditions