Norwegian Wood

Like Proust's Madeleine cake, the Beatles song of the title sets off a wave of memories for the narrator, Toru Watanabe as his remembers his teenage relationships with fragile first love Naoko and impetuous and unpredictable Midori. In a classic love triangle set-up, he must choose between the two and what paths they represent, he must choose between the future and the past.

Eschewing most of Murakami's typical surreal suburbs and science fiction ticks, this is a straightforward and poignant mediation on love, haunting and emotional and tinged with wounds from the past. His character, Toru- not entirely dissimilar to Murakami's own self at university, rehashes student days in Tokyo, adrift in a world of uneasy friendships, casual sex, passion, loss and desire. Murakami captures the huge expectation of youth, and of this particular time in history, for the future and for the place of love in it. The book is pastoral and dreamy and introspective without ever being too earnest. The narrator's reflections on his teenage self are dealt with delicately and the tragic nature of his love triangle, as it ebbs towards its conclusion, is filled with quiet emotion and intense beauty. Not only is this Murakami's most romantic novel, it's probably the best jumping-on point for his work