Almost Transparent Blue by Ryū Murakami

As I was reading this book, I thought that the only thing I could say about it is that if I had ever wanted to lead a completely dissolute life this book would have dissuaded me. Page after page of impersonal and sometimes violent sex, drugs of all sorts, rotting food, and a variety of bodily fluids and bodily reactions. Who of my generation would have thought sex, drugs, and rock and roll could be so disgusting? But, on reflection, I realized that towards the end of this mercifully brief novel, the narrator, Ryū, reveals a remarkable observational and imaginative capability (although what is hallucination and what is real is hard to say), and some of the characters exhibit some fond feelings for their families or home regions. So maybe there's a glimmer of hope.

As an added note, I found the treatment of the African-American soldiers from the nearby US air base quite stereotypical.

I'm also glad the book was short. Although, I am glad that Ryu Murakami was a mini-author because other wise I would have fallen into the trap of assuming that all Japanese literature is like Endo.

jfetting, I'm glad you made that observation as it was one of the reasons I included Ryu Murakami. He is a love him or hate him kind of author and I knew that there was a high likelihood that he wouldn't go over well with many of the readers here, but I felt it was important that we see that not all Japanese authors write like Mishima, or Haruki Murakami. I wanted to show the huge variety in styles!

As for Almost Transparent Blue, I've been enjoying the various discussions across the different groups. My own musings can be found in Club Read 2012 and in the Japanese Literature group.