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“ The story begins at near midnight in a restaurant in Japan. Mari, a nineteen-year-old girl, is reading her book when a young man intrudes on her solitude after recognising her. Unbeknownst to her at the time this meeting of chance would turn her ostensibly quiet night out into one she would no doubt remember for a long time to come. Meanwhile, her beautiful sister Eri is experiencing an unnatural deep sleep, one that her not her sister, parents, nor anyone else can wake her from.
I'm not sure where to began with how I felt about this book. It had this feel to it that intrigued me immensely. The book moved along slowly in the tranquilness of the night. Our darkened world also seems to move slower than the illuminated one, and things can happen at night that wouldn't at day. I like a book that makes me think deeply about certain topics, even if causing the reader to think about those things wasn't particlularly the author's aim. This book had my mind in a flutter with all sorts of thoughts; mainly about the many sorts of relationships we have with various people and how we communicate, how an almost stranger is sometimes the easiest person to talk to, and the so very different lives we lead, especially the vast differences in personality of siblings.
This is definitely one of my favourite reads of this year. While I didn't particularly enjoy Murakami's After the Quake, I will certainly be on the lookout for his other books after my reading this one. ”
