I heart Murakami.

I read Norwegian Wood recently, and now I'm reading Kafka on the Shore. Both of these have taken my mind on a very strange trip. They are novels by Haruki Murakami.

"Haruki Murakami is quite possibly the most successful and influential cult author in the world today. The 59-year-old sells millions of books in Japan. His fifth novel, Norwegian Wood, sold more than 3.5m copies in its first year and his work has been translated into 40 languages, in which he sells almost as well. Last year’s novella, After Dark, shifted more than 100,000 copies in English in its first three months. His books are like Japanese food — a mix of the delicate, the deliberately bland and the curiously exotic. Dreams, memory and reality swap places, all leavened with dry humour. His translator, Professor Jay Rubin, says reading Murakami changes your brain. His world-view has inspired Sofia Coppola, the author David Mitchell and American bands such as the Flaming Lips. He is a recipient of the Franz Kafka prize, has honorary degrees from Princeton and Liège, and is tipped for the Nobel prize for literature." -Stephen Armstrong from Times Online




His writing has this weird affect on me, like it starts to change the way my mind works when I'm in the middle of his novels. I guess I'm not the only one. I've read a lot of books, and his are just so magical compared to others. He takes you into his world, and its like he's aware that he can do that. He realizes as he's telling you this story that he is drawing you in and he talks to you. I think he is my new second favorite author. I still like Tom Robbins more. Maybe after I've read 10 Murakami books I'll like him more though. We'll see because I plan on reading everything he's ever written. Anything about dreams fascinates me completely. I might be egocentric in thinking this, but I feel like my dreams are more intense than the average person. They have an intense effect on my psyche. The characters in Murakami's writing are so rich, and a lot of them have very surreal, dream-like experiences.