1Q84

This book was a slow, contemplative one with that Murakami sparkled added in.

Since it's, you know, three books, it's longer and the plot can feel like it's ebbing and flowing in odd ways because of that.

There are a lot of elements of this book that dip into what we already know. Hey, look, it's star-crossed lovers with the outside world preventing them from seeing each other. It's a book about a novelist! Very original! Ah yes, mentions of 1984 and a Communist cult, subtle!

This is very much a book about writing, if that makes sense. Tengo is a sad, lonely guy and writing fiction is his escape from reality. Much of what happens in the book is on a surrealist plane, inside of a world with two moons, little people with ominous, ill-explained powers, cocoons to grow ideas and people, and the idea of one's mind and essence split into two parts. There are perceivers and receivers.

Aomame is searching for Tengo, which means entering the world of his fiction, both of them lost inside of this surrealist world, although not everyone they speak with or encounter is seemingly aware of or inhabiting this parallel world as well. Maybe they are, maybe they aren't, it's sort of immaterial unless you yourself want to get lost in Cat Town.