Favourite Books of 2011: 1Q84

I had never heard of Haruki Murakami before the Nottinghamshire Readers’ Day on Nov 5th last year. I was a volunteer helper on the day, and as such I got a goodie bag, which contained a couple of books, other bits and pieces, and a t-shirt. Everyone else’s t-shirts featured Ian McEwan’s Solar, but for some reason mine simply said 1Q84 with the numbers in white and the Q in red. Then I started hearing about this strange trilogy everywhere, and all of it good, so I thought I’d better give it a go.

1Q84 on the Kindle

As the third book was as yet only available in hardback and the first two (published in one volume) in trade paperback, it proved cheaper to buy all three in Kindle editions. And that just goes to prove that design is totally irrelevant when the words are extraordinary in themselves. I was completely drawn in right from the start when Aomame jumps out of her taxi in the middle of a clogged expressway and climbs down some emergency stairs in her stockinged feet so she doesn’t miss an appointment to kill a man. The storyline alternates between Aomame and Tengo (a maths teacher who also writes fiction) to great effect – even though the relationship between the two threads doesn’t start to become clear until well into the story, it’s obvious they are related somehow. And Murakami writes with such skill and fluidity that you trust him to tell you what’s going on when it’s appropriate to do so, you just go along for the ride and enjoy every moment.

In summary, the story is a perfect example of speculative fiction – what would happen if there were a parallel universe where past events had happened slightly differently, and two people were somehow transferred there, after which everything becomes gradually more complex and surreal.

The year is 1984. Shortly after the murder mentioned above, Aomame realises something’s wrong when she notices policemen carrying guns and is told this is due to a massacre at a cult’s compound a few years previously, which made front page news yet she is sure never happened. Then she notices a second moon in the sky. She christens the year 1Q84 – the Q stands for ‘question’ – and is determined to work out what’s going on. Tengo is thrown into strangeness when he agrees to ghostwrite a ‘fairy story’ originally written by a teenager known as Fuka-Eri so his editor can win a prestigious literary prize. He can’t work out how much of the story is actually true. Somewhat frustratingly, we aren’t told much about this story until very late on in the book, and even then we don’t see much of it… I wonder if Murakami (or his publishers) intend to bring it out as a novella in a year or so…

The main characters are totally engaging and it’s a beautiful story beautifully told. Take this quote (which I highlighted on my Kindle – a stupidly fiddly process – but that’s a post for another day), for example:

There was an inexhaustible source of clouds in some land far to the north. Decisive people, minds fixed on the task, clothed in thick, gray uniforms, working silently from morning to night to make clouds, like bees make honey, spiders make webs, and war makes widows.

Is that not beautiful?

 

I’ve bought the real books, as I will definitely be reading them again and I want to do it properly next time. These are bloody amazing. Read them. You won’t regret it.