The City and Its Uncertain Walls

A Novel

By: Haruki Murakami, Philip Gabriel - translator

Narrated by: Brian Nishii

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • A GLOBE AND MAIL BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR • A REAL SIMPLE BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR • From the author of Norwegian Wood and Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World comes a love story, a quest, an ode to books and to the libraries that house them, and a parable for our peculiar times.

"Haruki Murakami invented 21st-century fiction." —The New York Times • "More than any author since Kafka, Murakami appreciates the genuine strangeness of our real world." —San Francisco Chronicle • "Murakami is masterful." —Los Angeles Times

When a young man’s girlfriend mysteriously vanishes, he is heartbroken – and determined to find the imaginary town where he suspects she has taken up residence. Thus begins a lifelong search that takes the man into middle age, to a job in a remote library with mysteries of its own, and on a journey between the real world and this otherworld: a shadowless city where unicorns roam and willow trees grow.

There he finds his beloved working in a different library – a dream library. But she has no memory of their life together and, as the seasons pass and the man grows more uncertain about the porous boundaries between these two worlds, he must decide what he is willing to lose.

A love story, a quest, an ode to books and to the libraries that house them, The City and Its Uncertain Walls is a parable for these strange times– and singular and towering achievement by one of modern literature’s most important writers.

"Truth is not found in fixed stillness, but in ceaseless change/movement. Isn't this the quintessential core of what stories are all about?” —Haruki Murakami, from the afterword

Beautifuly read and written.

Murakami has a sound and a feel that will either resonate deeply with you or not. It is worth everyone's time to find the art that makes them feel something in addition to admiration and for me this story did that.

Extraordinary Writing

While this novel evolved over 40 years from a short novella, I read it as a fan of Murakami for the past 35 years. The story unfolds,with its iconic jazz references, continually emphasizing time, memory, and the contemporary notion of awareness. Undoubtedly there’s much to be said about this novel. But having just finished it, I believe this is a book that speaks to many dimensions of experience and existence, Classic Murakami but also a literary master pushing his craft beyond his own literary history. Extraordinary.

Wonderful

I loved this book. I have read other books by Murakami, but this one is different. It has a gentleness and a sweetness about it that reminds me a little bit of Ishiguro’s buried giant.

outstanding, his best

I really feel like this is a culmination of Murakami's entire career as a writer. A masterpiece.

An interesting revisit of old ideas!

I disliked the first third of the novel because of how much ground it retread from Hardboiled Wonderland and the End of the World. But by the second part of the novel I was compelled and found there to be many beautiful and successful passages. I think it's one of his most straight forward books from a symbolism perspective. I really like how it employs a dangling conversation throughout. And I thought the end was cool.