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GeekNights Book Club - 1Q84: Book Club Review

edited July 2012 in GeekNights

Tonight on the GeekNights Book Club, we bring you our thoughts on Haruki Murakami's 1Q84. It's the book club, so we'll assume you've read the book. If not, then this won't make a whole lot of sense (though this bingo card might give you a hint of what happens). But before that, briefly, we consider Facebook's continued failure as an IPO, chained as it is to the sinking boulder of Zynga, Google's Fiber initiative in Kansas City, and announce that the next book in the GeekNights Book Club will be The Man Who Was Thursday.

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  • Oh man, you didn't use my Book Club logo :(
  • For the most part I enjoyed this book but there were a lot of things I didn't like.

    For starters, the book was unnecessarily long. The first half was very engaging where it presented the characters and the various plot elements. The whole "other world" and "little people" was very intriguing. There were many things going on that made me go WTF and I couldn't wait to find out what was going on.

    However, as the book went on it gradually lost my interest. There were so many unnecessary repeats of details. How many times does Murakami have to remind me about Aomame's small uneven boobs, Aomame's childhood friend, Tengo's amazing abilities when he was a student, Ushikawa's oddly shapped head, Fuka-Eri's funny way of speaking, Tengo and Aomome's hand touching in the class room, their messed up childhood, etc?

    It seemed every chapter I was either a rereading about a character's past, their inner dialogue, or their physical appearance with only a slight bit of new information. It felt like I would read a chapter and find out that I had barely learned anything new or progressed much at all in the story. Everything could have been told in half the length. After a while it just became tedious reading the same thing over and over again.

    There were also parts of the story that seemed to have no purpose but to increase the length of the book. Near the end Aomame sits in the safe house and literally does nothing but yearn for Tengo yet chapters upon chapters are still dedicated to her. The entire Ushikawa investigation is painfully and gratuitously drawn out. Tengo's visit to his Dad took up a lot more pages than it should have. Also, what was the point of repeatedly emphasizing him as a child prodigy when that never became relevant during the plot?

    The plot itself had many weak elements. The whole Tengo and Aomome relationship is pretty absurd and unbelievable. So they touched hands as a kid and have been longing for each other since? Granted, it's suggested that they are "connected" somehow but it was hard for me to care about their love story or whether or not they will meet due to such a weak romantic structure. Also, the narrator repeating the same story about their childhood does not make me care more. Having the characters masturbate to each other's names also does not make me care more.

    There is also not much of a release or climax. The resolution of some of the major plot points are very underwhelming. Such as when Aomame meets and kills the Sakigake leader and when Aomame finally meets Tengo. I was left with a "wait, that's it?" feeling. A lot of the minor plot elements are never resolved. What ever happened to Fuka-Eri? The Dowager? What exactly are the little people and what do they do? What is the fate of Sakigake? What is up with the immaculate conception?

    Despite this I still enjoyed this book more than I didn't. I agreed with most of what was said in the episode, and I enjoyed the allegorical elements and his writing style. I just felt like the book dragged on longer than necessary without a specific driving force connecting the random plot elements.

    Is this book suppose to be a romance? A sci-fi story? A fantasy story? Social commentary? It doesn't seem to be good at any of them.
  • edited July 2012
    Is this book suppose to be a romance? A sci-fi story? A fantasy story? Social commentary? It doesn't seem to be good at any of them.
    I want to address this point.

    Why does a story have to cleanly and strongly fit the mold of an existing and popular genre? Is it not actually a positive aspect of the book that it isn't just another cookie cutter tale that fits neatly in a genre?

    As for the length and repetition, I like that sort of thing. How many scenes in Evangelion are nothing more than a shot of the empty street with cicadas chirping? How many scenes in Galaxy Express 999 are just the train chugging along through space? I like these repeated scenes because they allow you to experience the atmosphere of the world instead of just moving the plot along at a grueling pace.

    I also like some amount of repetition. It is an important thing that allows the repeated ideas to have elevated significance above non-repeated ideas. Things that are not repeated are not usually remembered very well, even by people with good memories. Repeating an idea firmly implants it in the readers mind such that it lingers even as you read over other passages.
    Post edited by Apreche on
  • Man Who Was Thursday is on Project Gutenberg also.

    http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/1695
  • Oh nice, I just started listening to the podcast and Rym said something about pay $2.50 for it so I just assumed the Kindle one cost money. Then what did Rym buy? O_o
  • There's a version that has a biography of the guy in the front that costs 2.25 on the Kindle.
  • I bought the Penguin Classics edition for the awesome cover and the smell, but it also has extra stuff in it. The footnotes are really useful.
  • edited July 2012
    Ah gotcha.

    Also maybe it's just me but I hated almost every one of the Aomame chapters. Beyond the need for her as a catalyst for the plot progression I felt like the book would have been better without her in it.

    EDIT: Actually I should say I mostly just hated Aomame, her chapters weren't that bad except for when it just focused on her. When she was just a participant in something I liked her situations.
    Post edited by MATATAT on
  • When does Man Who Was ... have to be read by for club? I thought I'd re-read it. Also if you are interested in finding out about the world that spawned it I highly recommend
    Alex Butterworth's excellent history The World That Never Was: A True Story of Dreamers, Schemers, Anarchists, and Secret Agents.
  • Also, I really liked IQ84 -- can't wait to hear the show.
  • Chekov's concealed gun
    Chekov's CCW?
  • For the most part I enjoyed this book but there were a lot of things I didn't like.

    For starters, the book was unnecessarily long.
    You do realize 1Q84 was originally three volumes, right? That's where both the length and the repetition of details come from.

  • I marathoned the last third over the weekend. I pretty much agree with everything iruul said. It really lost my interest during the last book, and I ended up feeling like the whole thing was not worth the time investment. Which is really too bad because I do like all the characters and I like the idea. There just wasn't really enough "plot" for me to get into for the length of the book. I wouldn't mind the length so much if the non-plot scenes were used to give more atmosphere, but they really didn't.

    I also admit that I'm not much of a literary type, so I'm not very adept at picking up on themes and subtleties. When the book talked about there being two moons, I just assumed that they were two moons and that was it. I never assumed they were representative of something else.

    The feel of the book was very much like another Japanese novel I had to read in school and recently re-read (to determine if I wanted to keep the book longer or not), Snow Country by Yasunari Kawabata. I imagine that if you liked 1Q84, you'd like Snow Country too. I didn't like Snow Country personally for some of the same reasons I couldn't get into 1Q84, but at least it's a much shorter novel.
  • I didn't think that there wasn't anything that I was left thinking about really. My major concern with a lot of the story was the idea that these two had like a brief moment between each other and then 20 years later realized they just had to be together.

    Also what was up with Aomame never referring to her child as a child, or a baby. She always calls it "little one" which I thought was gonna be some sort of surprise but wasn't.
  • edited August 2012
    I also admit that I'm not much of a literary type, so I'm not very adept at picking up on themes and subtleties. When the book talked about there being two moons, I just assumed that they were two moons and that was it. I never assumed they were representative of something else.
    This is why we want everyone to read more books, not listen to audio books, to build up reading skill. Reading skill is extremely low in the world, even though basic literacy is very high.

    That is the thing with art. Much art in the world offers its entire self on a spoon to the audience. You go to see a summer blockbuster, and you walk out with 100% of what that movie had to offer. You read a book and you come away with only 25% of the treasure. Where was the rest of the treasure? It was right there in the book, but you didn't have the skill, or put forth the effort, to extract the other 75%. A book that has buried its meanings is far more bountiful as each sentence holds the riches of two or three others, if only you are able to dig it out.

    The same is true with games much more literally. Most players miss large percentages of content in video games due to lack of skill or effort. Even someone who beats a game with 100% completion may miss a great deal due to lack of skill. Did you really experience the full thrill of Portal if you didn't finish some of the puzzles with insane speed? You will never know what that feels like if you are unable to pull it off. In a board game I may see underlying mechanisms which are invisible to less experienced players. The game for me is now a robbed tomb. A new place I have discovered, yet is bereft of treasures. To others it is still a bountiful orchard of fruits untasted.

    I did not know how to read properly until I luckily had a great English teacher in 7th grade. For those of you who were not so lucky, here is one thing you can do to start down the path. Whatever you read next, even if its a comic book, you must keep one thing in your mind. Every word (and/or picture) in the book was put there intentionally by the author(s). Out of all possible words, why did they choose that word and not some other word? In reality monkeys on typewriters do not write great works, nor do people who write randomly and frivolously. The words of a great book are there on purpose. Discover that purpose, and the power of the book shall take you.

    Let us try one that is relatively simple. Why did Murakami choose to give Aomame the name Aomame?
    Post edited by Apreche on
  • edited August 2012
    Because she's like soybeans and potentially delicious with seasoning salt.
    Post edited by MATATAT on
  • I read all my books with my eyes, but I've just never been one to really analyze what I'm reading. My brain isn't wired to do that on its own. But that is good advice, and I'll try to do that more when I read Man Who Was Thursday. I should also get advice from my girlfriend. She is an English major after all.
  • edited August 2012
    I read all my books with my eyes, but I've just never been one to really analyze what I'm reading. My brain isn't wired to do that on its own. But that is good advice, and I'll try to do that more when I read Man Who Was Thursday. I should also get advice from my girlfriend. She is an English major after all.
    I have heard people say that "their brain doesn't work this way." I don't believe it. It is something that must be learned. I highly doubt anyone is born with this ability. But I also believe that anyone who is capable of becoming literate is also capable of learning to read for real.
    Post edited by Apreche on
  • Isn't literary analysis a basic part of English class in the US? From elementary school onward, it was almost entirely this sort of analysis.
  • Isn't literary analysis a basic part of English class in the US? From elementary school onward, it was almost entirely this sort of analysis.
    Oops. I accidentally said 7th grade, I meant 10th grade. And yeah, the English class I had in 10th grade was better than any class I had ever, even far better than any I had at RIT.

  • I have heard people say that "their brain doesn't work this way." I don't believe it. It is something that must be learned. I highly doubt anyone is born with this ability. But I also believe that anyone who is capable of becoming literate is also capable of learning to read for real.
    Of course, it is something that I can learn to have over time. It just doesn't come as naturally to me as math does, for instance. That's all I meant.
    Isn't literary analysis a basic part of English class in the US? From elementary school onward, it was almost entirely this sort of analysis.
    In theory. I can't say much about my elementary school, since I don't remember much of it. But in high school I had the same English teacher for three years, and she wasn't very good at it. By the time I got to my one literature class in college, the professor kind of expected us to already have the skills necessary, but I was lost most of the time. I thought to myself, "Wait, what? Where did you get that from?" pretty much every discussion. That class was my lowest grade during my whole four years there.
  • edited August 2012
    Is there any PROVEN difference between a physical book and an audio book? Like, does it REALLY matter?

    I listen to a book every 2 weeks during exercise and commute, and unless someone can give me a REALLY good reason why I would want to spend additional hours reading the physical book, when I can just listen to it.. Why would I ?

    What do you see? WHAT DO YOU SEE?????? TELL ME!!!!!!!

    Edit: Apart from the fact that I can't spell all the made up nouns, Korrae, Chorae, whatever, having only HEARD them :P But really.. not that. Is there science or is this just BS? A story is a story if you ask me.

    Post edited by InvaderREN on
  • Yes, there is a difference, but most of Scott's position is rather lacking in evidence.
  • edited August 2012
    Is there any PROVEN difference between a physical book and an audio book? Like, does it REALLY matter?

    I listen to a book every 2 weeks during exercise and commute, and unless someone can give me a REALLY good reason why I would want to spend additional hours reading the physical book, when I can just listen to it.. Why would I ?

    What do you see? WHAT DO YOU SEE?????? TELL ME!!!!!!!

    Edit: Apart from the fact that I can't spell all the made up nouns, Korrae, Chorae, whatever, having only HEARD them :P But really.. not that. Is there science or is this just BS? A story is a story if you ask me.

    Well, to begin with, it wouldn't take you additional hours to read the physical book if you read more physical books. If you read more, your reading skills would increase and you would be able to read faster without sacrificing comprehension.

    Get a stopwatch and a page of a book. Time yourself reading the page out loud. That is the audiobook speed. That assumes you don't speed up the audiobook 2x, which people do. Now get a stopwatch and read the same page to yourself. I will do this right now.

    First (Kindle) page of translator's preface to Crime & Punishment timed imprecisely with iPhone stopwatch:
    Reading out loud - 55.7 seconds
    Reading to self - 20.3 seconds

    I guess I'm even faster than an audiobook at 2x.

    Even if you pass over any arguments about possible neurological implications, there is at least one reason to read with your eyes. That is to improve your reading skill and speed, which are extremely important skills that affect every day life.

    Consider how important reading speed is on the Internet. I can read a forum post faster. I can read more Wikipedia pages and research things faster. I can read a page of Google search results faster. There are so-called speed reading techniques out there, but really the only way is practice. If you are reading more slowly than an audiobook , then I consider that to be pretty bad. Imagine how good you would be at reading now if you had read all those books instead of listening.

    That at least doesn't require much evidence. Practicing reading will make you better at reading.
    Post edited by Apreche on
  • Reading also provides etymological information, especially when reading in English.

    In The Prince of Nothing, for example, there is consistent fabricated set of root languages implied by the spellings of proper nouns that add both color to the work and make it much easier to understand context. In fact, having access to this allows the reader to infer a great deal more about the world than hearing the words alone could possibly allow.

    Further, a narrator brings their own bias, emphasis, tone, and thus interpretation to the work. Don't you want to experience the work directly, rather than through an additional unnecessary layer of interpretation?
  • Don't know if I've said this before, but just want to make sure. If you are visually impaired, listen to all the audio books you want.
  • Edit: Apart from the fact that I can't spell all the made up nouns, Korrae, Chorae, whatever, having only HEARD them :P But really.. not that. Is there science or is this just BS? A story is a story if you ask me.
    You don't know how those words arespelled, I don't know how some of those words are said aloud. So both styles has it's problems.
  • RymRym
    edited August 2012
    You don't know how those words arespelled, I don't know how some of those words are said aloud. So both styles has it's problems.
    How they're said aloud is almost ALWAYS able to be accurately gleaned from a combination of context, etymology, and phonics. More information is lost in the listening to a word than from the reading a written word.

    Also, I hope all those typos and grammar issues were purposeful, or you're going a long way to prove my point. ;^)
    Post edited by Rym on
  • You don't know how those words arespelled, I don't know how some of those words are said aloud. So both styles has it's problems.
    How they're said aloud is almost ALWAYS able to be accurately gleaned from a combination of context, etymology, and phonics.

    Also, I hope all those typos and grammar issues were purposeful, or you're going a long way to prove my point. ;^)
    I don't really agree with this at all. Names, especially names in fantasy literature, are very difficult to work out the pronunciation of unless the author deliberately hints or provides a glossary of names (as Robert Jordan did.) Context and etymology have very little to do with some of the stuff that passes for names in a variety of fantasy novels, and phonics, especially English phonics, aren't always clear.
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