Kafka on the Shore

Haruki Murakami · b. 1949 · Japan

Originally Umibe no Kafuka (Japanese) · translated by Philip Gabriel

Why it matters

A runaway boy named Kafka and an old man who talks to cats, on converging roads through a metaphysical Japan. The global Murakami phenomenon at full tilt: riddles left deliberately, pleasurably unsolved.

At a glance

Dual alternating storylines and surreal symbolism left deliberately unresolved.