Dance Dance Dance (Vintage International) by Haruki Murakami (EPUB)

Description

Dance Dance Dance—a follow-up to A Wild Sheep Chase—is a tense, poignant, and often hilarious ride through Murakami’s Japan, a place where everything that is not up for sale is up for grabs.As Murakami’s nameless protagonist searches for a mysteriously vanished girlfriend, he is plunged into a wind tunnel of sexual violence and metaphysical dread. In this propulsive novel, featuring a shabby but oracular Sheep Man, one of the most idiosyncratically brilliant writers at work today fuses together science fiction, the hardboiled thriller, and white-hot satire.

User’s Reviews

Reviews from Amazon users which were colected at the time this book was published on the website:

⭐A few short points1. My paperback copy is not the one with the woman’s eyes looming over a building. This seems to matter to some reviewers2. The Sheep man is not one of my favorite Murakami inventions.I became a fan of Haruki Murakami after reading IQ84. Since then I have been reading his books in order limited to what has been published in English. I am enjoying the process of the introduction of various signature Murakami constructs and conventions. Dance, Dance, Dance is not my favorite or closer to my favorite Murakami books. Of the things I like about it, is about the return of the Sheep Man, and more I cannot say at the risk of a spoiler. For me it is fun to note the advent of what will become staple characters and conventions. Otherwise I am not sure if this is a good starting point for someone with no previous experience of opinion about Murakami. Recommendation: a definite yes for Murakami fans and yes for newcomers but not an enthusiastic yes.Once again Murakami speaks to us via a nameless protagonist. He is pretty much the same character in his first three books and is not that different from the central male character we will find in some later books. He is slightly disaffected and alienated and speaks more for post Woodstock, Pre Yuppie generation. He is Japanese but as before heavily influenced by Western, especially American culture. He Drinks, constantly and is fairly ready to bed any woman who shares his interest in a one night stand.He is reflexively anti-establishment and takes unlikely to join a support the local police movement. This last part seems to be his only motivation for failing to cooperate with the police in a murder investigation. A failure that may seem heroic given how hard he works at it, but to me it seemed at best pointless and at worst a huge character flaw. This aspect of the novel seriously aggravated me. No doubt it might have read as a populist position at the time the book was published.Our un-named narrator for reason never clear is drawn to return to a sleazy, run down hotel as part of finding a previous girlfriend. He motives seems to be between a Spirit Walk and a rescue mission. It may be that the narrator is unsure which and not overly driven to completed either mission. Along the way he will reconnect with the Sheep man who will make his usual jumbled remarks. He will also interact in ways generally positive with several women; a teen ager, he mother and a Hotel employee and a fourth woman a skilled high price call girl.So yes there is some sex and I guess some violence but neither is graphic or involving many pages of exposition. The language is not likely to offend most readers, but if immorality, drinking, smoking, casual sex (discretely narrated) offend you Dance, Dance, Dance is not for you.

⭐The return of the protagonist from the Rat trilogy is so fun. Murakami seems to have firmly adapted his style with lessons from Norwegian Wood. Namely, character names are powerful, but the protagonist continuing namelessly is interesting.I love this particular world, and glad that we could have one more look into it.

⭐“Wild Sheep Chase” must be read before starting this sequel, because Murakami does not give the new reader adequate background about the characters or plot of the previous novel. The story kicks off with the narrator forming a friendship with former classmate Gotunda, who is now a matinee idol. Gotunda has also slept with Kiki, the narrator’s one-time girlfriend, ear model and call girl, but she has vanished from both their lives. Hoping to find her, our narrator returns to the Dolphin Hotel, only to find that the old hotel has been replaced by a modern hotel high-rise. The new hotel is inhabited by the spirit of the old hotel, which occasionally reappears on different floors, somewhat like “Brigadoon” meets “The Shining.” He becomes enamored of the very proper desk clerk, Yumiyoshi, and it is she who brings sassy, clairvoyant, 13-year old Yuki into his life. From here the story a delightful human drama, with the two of them guiding and transforming each other’s lives. Murakami then engages us in a murder mystery, which involves Kiki and takes a rather bizarre turn. For those of us who did not want “Wild Sheep Chase” to end, Murakami has given us a satisfying and surreal second half. Though not as exciting as “Wild Sheep Chase,” it is filled with memorable characters. If you are new to Murakami, your might gauge your reading pleasure by how much you liked or disliked the tv classic “Twin Peaks.”

⭐I continue to read Haruki Murakami with absolute delight. This is heralded as a sequel of his “Chasing wild sheep” It is helpful to read “Sheep”, but it is not necessary as Murakami provides enough details to give you a solid background to read the story. I had finishing reading “Sheep” and was looking for another one of his stories (I have read six so far) to read. I researched some of the book reviews and “Dance, Dance, Dance” was recommended. One of the reason people were recommending the book is Murakami provides some biographically facts through his character and story. I thought “Sheep” was a good read. “Dance” was one of those books that not only do you relate to, but it become a friend and you are sad when it ends. The narrator is a lost soul at thirty four. By using character foils the narrator goes through a metamorphosis. The metaphysical world continues through the book with his lost girl “Kiki” leading the way. I also felt the author biographical part of the story, to the point I could relate to not only the narrator’s metamorphous but some of the characters he meets.The only downside I found is you read a lot of Murakami, he seems to use stero type characters.To me it was a great book and one of the reasons I gave it five stars is there enough material in the philosophy and thought the major of the readers will enjoy it.

⭐Although this book follows ‘The Rat’ trilogy, it really isn’t necessary to read those first to fully appreciate Dance Dance Dance. I read The Wild Sheep Chase (the third of the trilogy) after this and it was more like a prequel, just filling in a few blanks. Dance Dance Dance will feel immediately familiar to anyone who has read Murakami before, and is a great introduction for those who haven’t. Many others have described the storylines so I won’t repeat any of that – suffice to say, it’s a really engaging story of murder, mystery, intrigue, dreamlike or supernatural happenings depending on your interpretation, a rather hapless protangonist, a sullen teenaged girl, a one-armed poet, and of course, a dead cat. All delivered through Murakami’s exquisite writing.

⭐One of my favourite writers of all time and he doesn’t disappoint with this excellent last part to the rat series. I read a wild sheep chase before this but I didn’t read the very first novels in the series (Hear the Wind Sing and Pinball) but it doesn’t matter whether you read the whole series or not. Each book is brilliant in its own way.If you are new to Murakami, I reccomend starting with 1Q84 – it’s such a stunningly exquisite way of writing that will most likely turn you into a huge fan of Murakami and want to read all his books! Dance Dance Dance is another one of my favourites. Highly recommended author and a fantastic book.

⭐This was my first introduction to Murakami; I had no idea who he was, his writing style, or what the story was about. I stayed up late that night finishing it and was hooked. While Dance Dance Dance is the second part of a two-book series, I think it stands better alone. The secret of reading Murakami is to accept everything that comes you way. It there is a mysterious floor on the Dolphin Hotel with a sheep-man, just take it as a fact of life.

⭐As a murakami fan I dove into this novel expecting a compelling ending the the rat series and was thoroughly disappointed. Its as if murakami couldnt decide on where the story was going from the start and had no particular message or theme he wanted to portray. Overall it was unlike any of his other works I have read and was painfully mediocre.

⭐The sequel to

⭐A Wild Sheep Chase

⭐was another of Murakami’s books I found it difficult to develop a strong opinion on either way. The first 100 pages or so breezed past, with echoes of the earlier novel reverberating around and opening up some interesting possibilities, unfortunately I didn’t feel the second half the book lived up to the promised potential.As always, Murakami writes beautifully and lyrically with a cast of well-thought out and believable characters and that will be enough to satisfy some. In recent interviews, the author’s said that he doesn’t really plan out his plots, he just sits down and writes, and I think the drawbacks of that style are particularly evident here, as things seem to rather peter out near an ending which is much more low-key than the build up suggested. I still quite liked it in places, but this is far from Murakami’s best.

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