A novel of dazzling ambition and strange, haunting loveliness. Grippingly entertaining and bursting with life, it is an absolute triumph of the storyteller's art. Many books are hyped as "unputdownable". This one really is.

A master of his discipline rightly hailed as one of the best historical novelists writing today

A splendid piece of storytelling and a vivid recreation of a long-dead-world

Hypnotic, spellbinding

Addictive... Exhilarating... A pleasure

Murakami's most addictive fix to date

Engrossing and wildly inventive

Laden with philosophical overtones and enchanting wit

Murakami's exquisitely simple prose and deft evocation of the surreal are captivating and sublime

The mysteries are never tainted by explanation, merely beautifully described, delivering a hypnotic read

Such is the exquisite, gossamer construction of Murakami's writing that everything he chooses to describe trembles with symbolic possibility

Vintage Murakami [and] easily the most erotic of [his] novels

[A] treat...Murakami captures the heartbeat of his generation and draws the reader in so completely you mourn when the story is done

Murakami's most famous coming of age novel of love, loss and longing

Catches the absorption and giddy rush of adolescent love... It is also, for all the tragic momentum and the apparently kamikaze consciousness of many of its characters, often funny and quirkily observed.

[A] treat . . . Murakami captures the heartbeat of his generation and draws the reader in so completely you mourn when the story is done.

One of the most poignant and evocative novels I have ever read

Poignant, romantic and hopeless, it beautifully encapsulates heartbreak and loss of faith