The story of a young girl named Sumire who loved an older woman named Miu and was loved by the narrator. Each love was, in some sense unrequited, although in another sense simply lop-sided. Rather than a totally unrequited love on each side, there was only an unrequited sexual desire on each side. Sumire is a rather listless dilletante, experimenting with being a novelist without the experience to back it up. Her best friend is the narrator, who has fallen in love with her but knows it will never go anywhere, who is the only person she trusts to read her unpolished and unfinished works. One day she meets an older lady named Miu who she falls in love with while entering her employ. Sumire and Miu enter in to some kind of idealistic business relationship that sees a blossoming of Sumire in some ways but also a dulling of her creativity, as she diverts her attention towards obsessing over her employer. They eventually go on a business trip with each other and then suddenly Sumire disappears 'like smoke'. She is not found.
If you've never read any Murakami before you might wonder how the above synopsis might make a compelling story. But, it does. The topic isn't necessarily the events of a story but the psychology of connection, confirmed or assumed; it's the interplay between reality and the imagined, and a lack of definition over where you might draw the line. Literary types have called this theme 'magical realism' but i'd go further and call it 'magical mundanity' without any intended disrespect. Not much has to happen in a Murakami book before you feel yourself lulled in to a sense of nostalgic revery where the veil of reality has more give than you might allow of other authors.
There's a naivety about the romance in this book, tinged with the melancholy of a lonely unrequited love that perhaps gives good reason for that naivety. But it gives a sinister air where there perhaps shouldn't be one. I think that's playing with my own cynicism a little, but at least in one chapter (chapter 12) I felt my misanthropic cynicism justified.
When Murakami gets it right, he is one of the best....the only time I've been disappointed was with 1Q84 to be honest. But 'The City and It's Uncertain Walls' gave me back some confidence in his style (it still remains one of my absolute favourites). And going back to this much earlier book is a reminder of why he's special.
Finished reading - 15/05/26