AFTER DARK

In a stroke of genius, Murakami’s latest novel places listeners behind the lens of a camera and proceeds to describe what they are looking at. On the page, this is a finely crafted experimental novel; it also works especially well in the audio format. Janet Song reads to perfection, her voice shifting its tone slightly as she focuses on one character, then another. She seamlessly captures both Chinese and Japanese accents. The short novel itself, focusing on the lives of a few people as they struggle to exist between midnight and dawn in a seedy Tokyo neighborhood, might at first seem trivial. It is not. Perfectly paced, it slowly reveals more and more about these complicated lives. We’re not only interested—we’re mesmerized. R.R. Winner of AudioFile Earphones Award © AudioFile 2008, Portland, Maine [Published: FEB/ MAR 08]