Murakami's Global Reach

Haruki Murakami is Japan's most internationally famous living author, with novels translated into dozens of languages. Books like Norwegian Wood, Kafka on the Shore, and 1Q84 mix everyday detail with the surreal: talking cats, overlapping parallel worlds, women who appear and vanish.

He borrows as freely from American culture, jazz, Raymond Chandler, the Beach Boys, as from Japanese tradition. His huge global readership hints that a love of mystery and the unexplained, of letting questions stay open, speaks to readers tired of stories that tie up too neatly.