After the Quake

After the Quake – 3.5 Stars:

These short stories are “cute” and carry a consistent theme, but for me, they’re missing that Murakami magic. I found myself a little bored and often distracted while listening.

The only story that really stood out was “Super-Frog Saves Tokyo”—it had the right energy and vibe I associate with his best work.

Not my favorite from the author, but not without charm.

A short and great read. Overall it's good but man one of them was so bad. Hated all of children can dance.

It could have been better, but he had to include weird sexualisation of the mother character.

Like I know some people can think like sexually about their mother, but did he had to write it down?
It was really uncomfortable to read the story and hard to relate to the author.

The trope of adult Japanese women being oblivious to sex and thier sex appeal/attraction is honestly tiring.

Who acts like a kid as an adult and what's with Japanese media liking this. I really don't get them.

Without that the story was alright as the parts about it were good.

And from the rest really loved honey pie. From the rest, super frog saves Tokyo was fun and landscape with flatiron was memorable.

Really enjoyed this collection of short stories all linked to the Kobe earthquake, and the last one, Honey Pie, was just wonderful.

Mai mult un 3.5/5

Un OZN aterizeaza in Kushiro - 3
Peisaj cu fier de calcat - 3
Toti copiii Domnului danseaza - 3
Thailanda - 4
Broscanul salveaza Tokyo - 4
Placinta cu miere - 4

Notele de la fiecare povestioara se pot schimba, dar cel mai probabil nu o sa creasca :)

Absolutely terrible and a total waste of time. It's a collection of short stories with the central motif being an earthquake which plays absolutely no role at all with any subsequent plot developments. After introducing a couple of plot points, none of them are resolved at all. I was askance about the book half way through and despite that completed it. Highly pretentious, egregious and a chore to go through.



Plus the sex scenes are plain groan worthy.

“Whatever distinguishes one lump of flesh from another when we're alive, we're all the same once we're dead, just used-up shells.”

You know it's Murakami, when the characters stay with you long after you've finished reading the book.
After the Quake is a collection of short stories, about lives of some people and how differently they were all affected by one incident - The Earthquake at Kobe.
My personal favorite was Super-Frog Saves Tokyo, starts all dreamy and vivid, but ends on a very disturbingly horrid note.
Murakami isn't like any author I've read. He has a way of storytelling, which forces you to think about the characters and their lives, even after the story has ended.

Ši knyga tikrai nėra man, ir įtariu autorius taip pat ne man. Aš džiaugiuosi, kad knygą vargais negalais įveikiau ir tikiuosi, jog neteks Murakamio į rankas daugiau imti.

“Strange and mysterious things, though, aren't they- earthquakes? We take it for granted that the earth beneath our feet is solid and stationary. We even talk about people being ‘down to earth' or having their feet firmly planted on the ground. But suddenly one day we see it isn't true. The earth, the boulders, that are suppose to be so solid, all of a sudden turn as mushy as liquid.”

A lovely collection of short stories. Moving and mundane in the way Murakami has perfected. Not quite supernatural, and not quite simply strange, these stories are as simple and as complex as real life.

Even more bizarre than the previous book I read (After Dark). The atmosphere of the stories is as sterile as a hospital room, yet the oddities in each make them somewhat familiar, and they won't let you collapse into boredom because of the stark contrast of the humdrum routines and the outlandish happenings set into them. I can safely say that Murakami's style is something else, something you would be hard pressed to find in other author's books.

Di questo autore ho letto solo alcuni dei suoi romanzi sino ad ora, questa era la prima raccolta di racconti che leggevo, anche se so che ne ha scritte altre. Folgorato dai romanzi, rimango un po' deluso da questi racconti.

La mia opinione è che Murakami, nonostante la sua incredibile originalità che esce prepotente anche in questi racconti, non renda allo stesso modo che come nel romanzo. I racconti mi sembrano troppo brevi per poter dare respiro al suo stile.

Alcuni testi nel libro mi sono piaciuti più di altri, primo fra tutti l'ultimo “Torte al mele”: tre amici, due giovani studenti e una ragazza, tutti innamorati, ma di chi veramente? Altri li ho graditi decisamente meno su tutti quello del lombrico gigante; filo conduttore fra tutti un terremoto che colpisce una regione del Giappone, tutte le storie in qualche modo richiamano tale evento o lo fa da sfondo.

Lettura scorrevole e carina, ma decisamente ho preferito i suoi romanzi. Da rivalutare alla prossima raccolta di racconti.

After having this book on my wishlist for years, where do I finally find a copy? A library is moving to a smaller facility and is forced to purge its shelves of many extraneous books. A near perfect copy except for gigantic Magic Marker slashes through library information and a big W/D on the inside cover. Murakami takes his usual route through the world of the unusual, but the route always seems purposeful though precarious and strange.