Review: "Killing Commendatore" by Haruki Murakami

I am well aware it is predictable at best and hackneyed at worst to come into this review of Killing Commendatore, the new novel by my favorite author Haruki Murakami telling you how great it is, but it is. It is a phenomenal reading experience, one that envelops the reader throughout its 690 pages and is filled with enough engaging mysteries and riddles that it is hardly a disappointment that many of them go unanswered (it is quite the opposite most of the time) and shows that he has not slowed down as the man approaches 70, with this being his second longest book, behind 1Q84 and just a tad bit longer than The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle (which I will get too shortly). While I really, really liked it, I’m quite positive it is not going to be a “pillar” book, a work of art and artist can prop up their legacy with. Despite its length and the ideas contained with it, Murakami has tread similar ground in the past and like his other long haul novels mentioned previously, it is not a good introduction to his work. But for fans of his who have read most of his books, this is something worth checking out immediately (who am I kidding, you’ve picked it up already). The book focuses on an unnamed painter whose wife Yuzu has recently left him. After quitting his job as a portrait painter and spending a little while driving up the coast of Japan, he settles in the childhood homes of his friend Masahiko Amada, whose father Tomohiko was famous painter. In the house, the narrator tries his best to adjust to his newfound autonomy, but once he finds an old, undiscovered painting in the attic depicting a scene from the opera Don Giovanni (the titular painting of the book’s title), it sets off a chain of events that bring a strange cast of characters into his life as well as some unexplainable phenomena, such as his eccentric neighbor Menshiki, whose motives are slowly revealed and may be the book’s most noticeable tribute to The Great Gatsby, a big pit in the wooded area behind the house which might have a creepy back story, an Idea come to life in the form of one of the characters in the painting, a young, talkative 13 year old girl and a strange journey through a world of Double Metaphors that is both hypnotic and menacing. I could see how critics could tear this book apart, because a lot of the plot points have been found in other books, like the pit and the martial trouble harkening back to The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle, the underworld excursion bringing to mind it’s futuristic cousin in Hardboiled Wonderland and the End of the World, the painting come to life recalling the symbols of Johnnie Walker and Colonel Sanders come to life in Kafka on the Shore,  as well as countless other references to other books, the most blatant one being to his last novel, but that was part of the fun of the book or any of his books: finding odd parallels between two or more characters, watching abstract ideas and concepts take shape and making the world a more meaningful, or at least interesting place. Murakami’s books have basically become critic proof, fans no what to expect and love what they get, and for better or worse, I am one of them. 

Rating: 5/5

Review: "The Labyrinth of Spirits" by Carlos Ruiz Zafon

It is safe to say that with the number of books I have left to read in 2018 that Carlos Ruiz Zafon’s conclusion to his Cemetery of Forgotten Book’s series, The Labyrinth of Spirits if the biggest surprise of the year. I recall being tremendously underwhelmed by the (now) second longest book of the series, The Angel’s Game and so when I found out that this book was going to be over 800 pages long (805 to be exact), I really wasn’t looking forward to it. Thankfully, my doubts were shattered by the time I was 10 pages in and never once did the wonder, elation and overall joy I felt while reading this love letter of a book dissipate. It is the kind of epic book, like Justin Cronin’s Passage trilogy or Gabi Gleichmann’s The Elixir of Immortality, to name a more obscure book, where a writer of immense talent simply uses said talents to tell the kind of story that fills the world around the reader with a little bit more magic, or at least as long as they are reading the book. It is a book with countless twists and turns, an aura of the immense and characters that will find deep, finally etched space within the reader’s subconscious long after they have finished it. The plot is rather daunting to explain, so I will try my best in what little time I allow myself in these reviews. First, I would like to say that you do not have to have read the previous books to understand the plot of this one, although there are many references to the other three. So, after a few interludes where we meet Daniel Sempre and Fermin, two characters who play major roles in the story, we meet our heroine Alicia Gris, an investigator for Spain’s secret police, at the forceful hand of her mentor Leandro, becomes embroiled in the search for Mauricio Valls, Spain’s minister of culture and the former warden of Montjuic Castle, where, after the Spanish Civil War, several dissident writers were imprisoned and tortured. It is in Valls office that Alicia, along with Vargas, a cop who is forced on her but slowly earns her undying trust, finds the first clue, a volume in a series of book that shares the novel’s title written by Victor Mataix, a writer imprisoned by Valls. This tiny clue takes them from Madrid to Barcelona, where Alicia almost lost her life during a brutal bomb raid, where they encounter Fernandito, a young man with unrequited love for Alicia, the quick witted Fermin and the whole of the Sempre family, as well as many dangers in the form of an unidentified maniac who reveals themselves in the book’s most shocking death, Hendaya, a brutal enforcer in the Secret Police and a shocking conspiracy that shakes the world of every character in the book. I won’t reveal too much, but the book is full of beautiful passages, many of which are brilliantly rendered dream sequences that would make Bolano blush and a quietly moving final hundred pages that reveal the true, beating heart of this book. It is a hefty read, but a rewarding one for those who find themselves easily lost within the pages of a good story. 

Rating: 5/5

Review: Theatre Review: "The Tragedy of Romeo and Juliet (Catalyst Repertory)"

This week is the second week of Indianapolis’s annual Bard Fest, a festival where a gathering of local theater companies each put on a production of a Shakespeare Play, and Catalyst Reparatory, the company behind my first reviewed production, Arcade Fire brings us a production of arguably the bards most famous play, The Tragedy of Romeo and Juliet. Unlike my first review, to give a synopsis of Romeo and Juliet would just be a waste of space for this review. If you are reading this you know the story: it was either forced on you in school, you performed in it or you have seen one of the countless adaptations of it. What I will do instead is focus on the performances of the actors and how it compares to the other productions of the story I have seen, which include Baz Luhrmann’s 1996 retelling, which shaped the idea of this play for a lot of those my age and a production my high school put on. I’m sure it is hard to present this story in a fresh way that does not come off hackneyed or unoriginal, and the director Zach Stonerock does his best, using minimal sets, basic costume design and lighting choices that let the play speak for itself. If you aren’t a fan of the play, which I am on the fence about, this play will likely not change that in its straightforward presentation. What I really took away with this play, both its good qualities and bad, come from the casting decisions and the performance of the actors. Firstly, the casting of the eponymous characters is rather spot on with Eli Robinson and Arcade Fire’s Kayla Lee embodying the youthful vigor and fatalism of the two star crossed lovers. It also helps that they look and are much younger than the rest of the cast. But this retelling’s true triumph is how it presents the story’s main conflict. The scenes with the two leads are imbued with the kind of unbridled lust felt by those just entering puberty, the kind of lust linked to series of bad choices that lead down a dark path. Their decisions come off as silly and wasteful, especially in the scenes involving the nurse and Friar Laurence, played by Beverly Roche and Kelsey Leigh Miller respectively (who give the play’s best performances, along with the actor who played the Prince, who for safety reasons cannot be named), who both seem to orbit these two young bodies that seem hell-bent on their mutual destruction. That might be the directorial intent to shed a light on aspects of this famous play that go unquestioned (for a really good analysis of this idea, watch the Nostalgia Critic’s editorials on this play and The Graduate). While this idea sets it apart, this is far from a perfect production, and its flaws could be quite glaring. The show as a whole lacks a certain gravity and emotional weight. It might have been the lack of intermission or something I can’t quite put my finger on, but I’m pretty positive it really wasn’t there. The secondary characters, such as Benvolio, Tybalt and both sets of parents left little impression on me, but the performance of Mercutio did, and in a bad way. The actor who played them, Kelsey VanVoorst, seemed too intent on chewing the scenery and overshadowing the other performers, with the Rosaline speech near the beginning coming off forced and painfully artificial and their eventual death and passionate dying words completely unearned, although their scene after the party produced the biggest reaction from the audience. Like I said before, this production of a most familiar play is not likely to change your mind about it, but it takes a few calculated risks, and I’m happy a few of them paid off. 

Rating: 3/5