Originally published in 2002 as 海辺のカフカ (Umibe no Kafuka)Winner of the 2006 World Fantasy AwardAn unlikely alliance forms betweenKafka Tamura, a fifteen-year-old runaway, & the agingNakata, a man who has never recovered from a wartime affliction, as they embark on a surreal odyssey through a strange, fantastical world.°°°“Kafka on the Shore(translated, from the Japanese, byPhilip Gabriel; Knopf; $25.95), is a real page-turner, as well as an insistently metaphysical mind-bender. Spun out to four hundred & thirty-six pages, it seems more gripping than it has a right to be & less moving, perhaps, than the author wanted it to be”— John Updike,The New Yorker, Jan. 2005“I think it is fair to say thatKafka on the Shoreis not one ofMurakami'smasterpieces (for what it's worth, this critical admirer would direct first-time readers to the gloriousA Wind-Up Bird Chronicle, the quieterSouth of the Border, West of the Sun, and the fertile story collectionsAfter the QuakeandThe Elephant Vanishes), but it is an inventive, alluring, striving novel, & would that more writers in translation hope to find such a large & hungry audience. Respect is due.”— David Mitchell (author ofCloud Atlas),The Guardian, Jan. 7, 2005“WithKafka on the Shore,Murakamicombines the coming-of-age theme ofNorwegian Woodwith the magical realism ofThe Wind-Up Bird Chronicle. The result is a novel that defies the laws of physics as well as the less easily enforced rules of conventional narrative fiction. YetMurakamialso relies on elements familiar from romance and mystery novel. IsKafkaguilty of the murder of his father? Can this question even be answered using the conventional clues & evidence of crime novels? In typicalMurakamifashion, the author! sets out a trail of surrounding circumstances that seem to undermine conventional notions of guilt & innocence.”— Ted Gioia,The New Canon