Norwegian Wood
My first Murakami novel: a quiet, unsettling story about love, grief, and the difficulty of reaching other people.
Last week, I finally finished Norwegian Wood, the novel I had been meaning to read for three months. I took it on a trip to Pokhara, and it turned out to be worth the wait.
This was my first step into Haruki Murakami’s world. It was an intense reading experience, but much of what stayed with me came from quiet conversations and letters rather than dramatic events.
A story shaped by absence
Toru Watanabe tells the story in the first person, looking back on his college years after the death of his close friend, Kizuki. That loss follows him into his relationships and colours the way he moves through the world.
The novel deals with love, loneliness, death, and mental illness. What struck me was how directly it could approach those subjects while keeping the language simple and beautiful. Toru’s isolation feels present even when other people are around him.
Reiko’s observation about everyone being a little less normal than they appear stayed with me. So did Toru’s uneasy relationship with being alone: wanting company does not necessarily make it easy to let someone into your life.
A book I read slowly
I read this more slowly than I usually read a novel. I wanted to spend time with the conversations and the way the characters tried, sometimes unsuccessfully, to understand one another.
By the end, I felt quite empty. I went looking online for interpretations of the ending, trying to make sense of where Toru had arrived and what came next. I wasn’t ready to leave the story just because I had reached the last page.
That lingering uncertainty was part of the experience for me. The book changed how I thought about its themes, and I kept turning them over after I put it down.
Where I want to go next
Norwegian Wood opened up a style of writing I wanted to explore further. I had heard that other Murakami novels move more strongly into fantasy, and Kafka on the Shore was the recommendation I kept getting. I had already bought a copy by the time I finished this one.
How long it would take me to read it was another question. But I knew I wanted to continue.
The novel also introduced me to the Beatles song that shares its title. That was a nice extra discovery.
For me, this was a 10/10 read: moving, unsettling, and difficult to stop thinking about. If you enjoy reflective, character-driven fiction and are comfortable with its themes of suicide, grief, and mental illness, it is a book I would recommend.
