1973年のピンボール

Flopped potential

Pinball alternates between the POV of two characters: an unnamed male narrator who lives with two female twins and works as a translator, and The Rat (鼠). It also includes many elements that will be familiar to Murakami regulars: an unnamed male narrator who feels oddly alienated to his surroundings, references to music, a sort of whimsical nostalgia on years gone by, etc.

I got into this book without having read, or knowing anything about, any of the other books in the series. And although it made sense on its own, I gave up about 1/3 of the way in because I realized that I didn't care any of the characters. Why should I? Murakami gives the reader no discernable reason to care.

The unnamed male narrator works a bit here and there as a translator. Occasionally, he talks to to one of the twins, who also work as a translators. The Rat likes to hung out at the beach. And... so what? Where is the conflict? Heck, forget conflict - where is literally anything interesting or distinctive about either narrator, that might hook the reader in?

Maybe something interesting happens later on in the story. But frankly, I don't want to spend more than a third of a book reading about characters staring at the beach before things start to actually happen.

I get that this was one of Murakami's early works, and therefore might not be as developed. But I actually think this book, and maybe even the entire series, should have gotten the axe from the editor.

Language-wise, this might be higher than its current 32. Murakami uses quite a bit of rare kanji (including writing どこ and なぜ out in kanji, 畏れ instead of 恐れ, etc.). If you're reading a physical copy instead of a digital one, and can't automatically look things up, be prepared for this.