Sputnik Sweetheart by Haruki Murakami Summary and Reviews
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Book Reviews of Sputnik Sweetheart
Book Review: Like sipping on a fine Burgundy...
Summary: 5 Stars
I envy you if you have not read this; there is something magical about that moment you begin this tale and realize how Murakami just keeps getting better with each novel. In fact, if you haven't read any of his novels, I'd suggest setting aside a weekend, buying a few such as this one, "Wind-Up Clockbird", "Dance Dance Dance" and "South of the Border, West of the Sun", stocking up on some good wine, snacks and cat food, unplugging the phone and then settling back for pure pleasure.His prose is stripped down to an almost zen-like state; I don't understand how it survives translation so well. Beautiful, like an Arvo Part of literature.
The story? Well, I won't spoil it, there is enough written here already. Just your basic tale of loneliness and artificial separation that so many experience in this cold and non-emotional twenty-first century. One can only wish that some people read these and actually learn something - that true contact involves emotions, is messy and is why we exist in the first place.
Enjoy!
Book Review: Simply Superb...Heart Wrenching...Thought Provoking
Summary: 5 Stars
...This book in more than one ways has managed to take me to a different land...a land of innocence lost, a land of loves betrayed, a land of hopes reborn - only to be shattered and a land of exquisite poetry. I never read Haruki Murakami earlier till i casually bumped onto it while checking out ... and then when i read the other reviews and the storyline, i knew i had to pick this one up...Many of my friends who read this book earlier called it a "strange love story". However i wouldn't classify it as that. to me the book ran deeper on various platforms of love and other such relationships. This book has re-defined for me the meaning not just of love, but of the madness associated with it too.
Then I went on to discover what was the actual representation of this mysterious, yet in many ways a most delightful book and i got my answers so fast...It was the missing person Sumire's story...it was her lover's quest to find her out and what he got were not just fragments of her life but more...
A must read for anyone who has ever fallen in love!
Book Review: He's done it again
Summary: 5 Stars
Always the master of forlorn emotions, Murakami has done it again. Frequent readers of his work will spot some familiar elements, yet I think he manages to avoid being caught in that trap of a middle aged writer unable to produce a new idea. Even if his characters' stuggles with love and life has played out before, this is a writer that just puts it on the page better than almost any other. Closest in feel to "South of the Border, West of the Sun", but I liked this one more than that one.Book Review: a down-sized but beautiful Murakami novel
Summary: 5 Stars
I'll admit first off that Murakami is one of my all time favorites and I've read every one of his novels available in English. I still think his masterpiece is The Wind Up Bird Chronicle for its sheer mass and scope, but I was impressed by this novel for just the opposite. In this rather short and seemingly simple novel, some of the deepest and most profound thoughts and events take place. Like our narrator in Norwegian wood, we have a young man devoted to a girl, in this case the lovable Sumire. Unfortunately, she feels no desire for him and instead falls in love with a married women. This is where things turn into Vintage Murakami with surrealistic events taking place (old Murakami fans will think of the elevator to another time zone type of thing). Here, Sumire disappears and our narrator sets out in search of her. What he ultimately discovers is what the reader will uncover.The prose is very sparse compared to his other novels, but I think Murakami does well in this kind of minimalist style which has a seething undercurrent lurking just beneath the surface. The emotions are heartfelt and deep -- our narrator suffers for his love and devotion. Not only another excellent Murakami novel, but an accessible one that should earn him some new fans. Hopefully this novel will direct new readers to his earlier masterworks.
Book Review: A deeply insightful portrait of human loneliness
Summary: 5 Stars
Most of Murakami's work revolves around a common theme -- the sense of isolation people feel and how easy it is for this loneliness to break your spirit and leave you little more than an empty shell. Sputnik Sweetheart focusses on the sense of loss people feel when they discover that love is fleeting and realize that the closeness they share with someone today will soon fade and may never be recaptured. The plot is fairly straight-forward. K is in love with his best friend Sumire, an aspiring writer who considers K to be a close friend, but nothing more. Sumire, in turn, is madly in love with Miu, a married wine importer who lost the capacity for love when she went through a traumatic experience as a student. Sumire sets aside her writing to work as Miu's personal assistant, and the two head off to Europe on a business trip. Sumire mysteriously disappears, and Miu summons K to help search for her.
Each of the novel's characters is scarred by loss, and like the Sputnik, each character feels isolated, connected to the world and the people around them by the most thin and tenuous of threads. Miu suffers a traumatic experience as a young student which leaves her half a person and turned her hair white. As K sees her for the last time, she is a hollow shell, and her white hair reminds K of bone that has had every bit of life bleached from it.
Sumire's sense of loneliness is even greater. Having never previously experienced or even understood love, she falls completely for Miu only to realize that Miu will never love her back. Like two satellites briefly passing each other in space, never to meet again, Sumire realizes that the has grown as close to Miu as she ever will and that she will eventually lose what little she has. She imagines another world where Miu's lost half still lives and abandons our world to seek Miu there.
K too feels isolated. As Sumire becomes increasingly enamored with Miu, K sees his best friend and closest confident slip away. When Sumire disappears for good, K does his best to move on with life, but the sense of loss stays with him, and as the novel concludes, K finds himself tempted to join Sumire somewhere in that other world.
If you're a Murakami fan, you need no encouragement to read this book. If you're new to Murakami and are wondering which work to start with, Sputnik Sweetheart will provide you with an excellent introduction to Murakami's writing and leave you wanting more. This is a beautifully written novel, and Murakami's simple, eloquent prose conveys they characters' loneliness like few other writers can. Bravo Murakami! We eagerly await your next book.