This book's rating was only due to Murakami's excellent descriptions of terror/fear, and the book's potential. 2 stars otherwise.
The gist of the plot is that an American tourist hires a guide to walk him through Tokyo's red-light district - and the guide realizes that his client is not all he is cracked up to be, and he might be the serial killer terrorizing the city. What follows are ruminations on Japanese society à la Fight Club, and a threadbare plot about everything and nothing that is surprisingly banal despite its rather gory descriptions.
Murakami tries hard, he really does. The descriptions of Tokyo are vivid, and some tangents on why Japanese society is the way it is does manage to grab you - but the pacing is all over the place ( extremely frenetic in some parts and slow as molasses in the others), and the length was too short, making the last quarter of the book seem like Murakami's attempt to cram a full book's worth of material in those pages, which unsurprisingly doesn't work.
If you can handle uneven pacing and gruesome digressions on morality, then go for it - it's worth the read. Not worth the time in any other case. ( )

Offbeat and intriguing, this suspenseful story of Tokyo's sex trade district takes a disturbing turn about halfway through, though what has gone before is rather disturbing itself. The tale of a sexual tour guide who begins to believe his client is a serial killer erupts into a nightmare that at once staggers the imagination and beggars credibility. The view of Japan's sleazy sexual underworld is more interesting than the bizarre monster at the center of the book. ( )

uff che lettura ^^ penso sia un libro pieno di pagine, parole e paragrafi superflui. Se si guarda la storia di per sé, al succo, non c'é niente di horror. Non si ha nemmeno quella paura che si prova nei thriller quando si è faccia a faccia con l'assassino.

Kenji fa da guida inofficiale a turisti stranieridella tokyo a luci rosse. Un bel giorno gli capita l'armericano Frank con il cervello un po' scombussolato. Fin da subito a Kenji non piace Frank per motivi non ben definiti, diciamo che Frank emana una certa soggezione con quei suoi occhi vuoti e sguardi velenosi accompagnati da frasi sconnesse, comportamenti incomprensibili e soprattutto quel modo di fare da buontempone che viene soffocato subito dopo da atteggimaneti bruschi.

Nel mentre ovviamente qualcuno sta brutalmente decimando in maniera brutale e psicopatica prostitute e senzatetto. Kenji fa due più due = Frank. Ma non ha prove, solo quella sensazione viscida e pura angoscia quando lo accompagna per i vari locali. Poi un giorno un collaboratore di Kenji gli racconta di aver ricevuto una chiamata stranissima da un americano che voleva il nr di conto corrente di Kenji. L'angoscia in Kenji aumenta, ogni piccola cosa sembra portarlo a un passo dalla fine.

Purtroppo dalla scrittura non traspare questa angoscia di Kenji. E pure tutta l'atmosfera di questa Tokyo by night non trova posto nella scrittura se non per la descrizione minuziosa degli avventori e dipendenti dei locali a luci rosse in cui vanno Frank e Kenji. ( )

I just finished this book and I have not stopped thinking about it ( )

Compelling. Staggering. Shocking. Exquisite. Brutal. Harrowing. I can't find exactly the right words to describe this novel but those are some that come to mind. This was my first foray into the writing of Ryu Murakami (no relation) and it was an absolute mind fuck.

Our host through this story is Kenji, a 20 year old self-employed "nightlife" guide. Kenji has been hired by Frank, an overweight American tourist, to tour him around the sex clubs of Kabuki-cho, Tokyo's red light district. What starts off as a simple, if distasteful job, turns into something else entirely when Kenji begins to suspect that Frank is a liar and, perhaps, a murderer.

From the opening pages Kenji is charismatic. As he walks us through his Tokyo, shares his thoughts, and introduces us to the characters in his orbit, his disillusionment is tangible, his weariness knowable. The world that he inhabits is dark and lonely and his only light is Jun, his 16 year old girlfriend. There is something about Frank which seems to defy all of Kenji's expectations; his suspicions grow and the tension is palpable.

I can't say much more without spoilers. This book was absolutely ( )