By fate or by intervention of the Little People, they unconsciously fell into the world with two moons together. Every time I get near the creature, there will be strange currents closing in from nowhere sweeping me away, deliberately keeping a distance between me and the creature. Following through Tengo and Aomame’s side of the story felt like chasing after a peculiar sea creature fifteen metres under the sea with unpredictable currents.

I would have thought Book 2 will have lesser twists and turns being the transition into the final book where two worlds break loose but I was so wrong. Book 2 in particular had already made its way up to the top of my list of favourites. The plot up till Book 2 was very well thought through one of the best flowing plot from Murakami in my opinion. My mind was constantly chanting “More, more, I need to know more” as I flipped through the pages. This shows how engrossed I was into the story. To complete a novel within a week can be considered my record time. I enjoy taking in the words in all pages unhurriedly, at my own pace. How the paths of Aomame and Tengo converge provides the steadily growing excitement of this huge, engrossing novel which was published in Japan in two volumes.I am a relatively slow reader. But media scrutiny threatens their cosy ghost-writing scam, and unearths Fuka-Eri's dysfunctional childhood in a closed religious cult. With her consent and his polish, her mystical story of malevolent 'little people' with sinister powers making a portal from their world to ours becomes a bestseller. A teacher and budding novelist, Tengo is persuaded by his editor to rewrite 17-year-old Fuka-Eri's inspirational debut manuscript. The landscape is similar enough for her to name it 1Q84, the Q standing for question, while she puzzles out how her own destiny is tangled up in the moral and procedural framework of this new reality.Īlternate chapters of 1Q84 explore Tengo's story. Somehow, 1984 has closed to Aomame, and the sequence of bizarre events that unfolds suggests that she has been drawn into a new universe which looks much the same, but has two moons. You probably wouldn't buy the latest Murakami for a slice of gritty realism, so it's reassuring that Aomame's decision pitches her headlong into a different reality, conveyed in Jay Rubin's lucid translation with plenty of zest. 'Things are not what they seem,' a taxi driver warns Aomame, as she chooses to hop out of his cab.

1q84 book 2