That this story predated the p2p craze by nearly a decade really raises my estimation of Murakami’s skills at innovative thinking quite a few notches. Their goal is to pirate knowledge produced by the System and make it available on the black market, while saving the choicest pieces for themselves. The System’s chief rival is the Factory, which employs Semiotecs. In Hard-Boiled Wonderland, the unnamed narrator is a “calcutec” working for the System, in a near-future (?) alternate Japan where information is the ultimate currency. Murakami’s whimsical adventure is a not-quite-noir, not-quite-cyberpunk, not-quite-mythological mashup whose hero is, quite literally, searching for his own mind. Dick fans and those who enjoy stories that get off on exploring inner rather than outer space ought to have a whale of a time with this. It’s like a game of hide-and-go-seek in the playground of the mind, where the true nature of self is just a little too well hidden to be found. Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World may not always be consistent in tone or execution, but it’s often brilliant and always utterly unlike most anything else on the racks. Indeed, said imagination appears to have sprung fully formed from his cortex. This early work by Haruki Murakami gives tantalizing glimpses of the otherworldly imagination he’d hone to near-perfection in later novels. Share book reviews and ratings with Thomas, and even join a book club on Goodreads. Book cover artwork is copyrighted by its respective artist and/or publisher. All reviews and site design © by Thomas M.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |