Rating: 
Summary: Slightly spaced-out Murakami
Review: I am a great Murakami fan but I found this book slightly disappointing at first - though it got better as the story unfolded.First, I dilked the way the narration switched between the omniscient narrator and the K character. Murakami is brilliant as the laidback "I" in the Sheep trilogy etc. but I found K rather spineless and unimaginative. Secondly, Murakami's depiction of lesbian love is not altogether convincing - it may be very realistic but inevitably he has formulated his ideas second-hand and it reads as such. I may be being picky here but I did not much like Gabriel's translation. The wonderful similes and use of hyperbole seem strained (which may be Murakami's fault) but I though the English was a bit mangled too - particularly Miu's conversation style which would be more befitting an 18 year old American than a sophisticated Japanese in her late thirties. Example at random (p39): ....its weird to have your own father become a statue. Imagine if they erected a statue of your father in the square in front of Chigasaki station. You'd feel pretty weird about it, right? For all that, the book does show flashes of style and humour, a desire to push the boundaries of novel writing and Murakami's unique and exciting ability to take the reader down one path only to divert at the last minute and take him/her somewhere else.
Rating: 
Summary: Human alienation
Review: Have you ever feel that you don't really understand what's going on around you, that you don't really belong, and you don't really connect with anyone or anything? That life is like 2 Sputniks, passing each other in space, never really connecting? Or that you could disappear off the face of the earth and no one would notice but the world would keep on going? In this concise nvoel, Murakami sucessfully painted a vivid picture of what human alienation feels like -- loneliness, despair, the need to love and be loved in return.
The story is about two loners, K. (a teacher) and Sumire (a novice writer), who found each other through their common interests in books and music. After the disppearance of Sumire, you could feel the longings and despair of K. It's not often that people connect with one another and once found, it is to be cherished. But K. lost Sumire -- Sumire just disappeared one day without leaving any clues to her whereabouts. For Murakami, such is life. Things happen, full of absurdities and confusions, but still, one must go on because it is the only life we have.
Rating:
Summary: A Lyrical Gem
Review: Since the Tokyo Gas Attack, Murakami's writing has turned more earnest, straightforwardly inquisitive. He's always been a philosophical writer, never afraid to delve into metaphysical issues. But whereas his books like "Wind-Up Bird Chronicles" dealt with such matters in a more subversively sinister way, "Sputnik Sweetheart" is a heartfelt inquiry to why and how we change, where our 'true selves' are. With Sumire's mysterious disappearance, Murakami plays a neat trick. The sense of dualism that people feel, of the 'other side', becomes almost physical and palpable as the narrator recounts her story (and Miu's). And this theme of dualism reaches its climax when there is an actual split of a person - a fictional maneuver, as implausible as it may sound, that works to perfection in Murakami's hands. Because of Murakami's unassuming, simple prose, when there's a philosophical musing, it never sounds heavy handed. His metaphors and characterization are, as always, dead on. But the customary strange and scary irresolution of his stories (i.e. 'Wind-Up Bird') is not here. Only a gentle contemplation of it. I wouldn't say it's sentimental, but it's more directly emotional than his other works. Although this book is fine and profound, I miss the sprawling ambition and themes in his previous books. This lyrical book reads more like a novella than a novel.
Rating: 
Summary: Two of Me, Two of You.
Review: I am a huge fan of Haruki Murakami. If one cared to look through my reviews one would see that I have read evetone of Murakami's books that have been translated into english. I didn't know what I was hoping for when i first delved into this book. I really enjoy Murakami's far out books like A Wild Sheep Chase and Dance Dance Dance, but I also really enjoy his books that are more realistic like Norwegian Wood and South of the Border, West of the Sun. This book seemed to be or of the former. The book is about Sumire a 22-year-old college dropout whose goal in life is to become a novelist. Unlike manny wannabe writers, Sumire actually does write, but she writes too much and her glimpses of brilliance are lost in piles and piles of paper. Enter our Narrator, K, friend of Sumire and elementary school teacher. Sumire has str9ong affections for K as a friend, but nothing more, but of course K has stronger feelings for Sumire. Enter Miu a woman of Korean descent who was raised in Japan. Sumire falls immediately in love with Miu, something she has never experienced before for a man or a woman. She ends up working for Miu, and follows her to Greece, and there Sumire disappears. Of Course her one true friend K comes as soon as he hears that Sumire is missing. Strangeness ensues. First it reminded me of the former it quickly fell to that latter, more A Wild Sheep Chase than Norwegian Wood if you will. This was a fabulous short novel by Murakami as many have stated before this one truly pulls at the heart strings because of the unabashed feelings that K has for Sumire without getting sappy. Good book check it out.
Rating:
Summary: Wanted to like it, didn't really.
Review: Like other reviewers, i find myself buying every Murakami book waiting for another Wind-Up bird. Or at least another Hardboiled. I guess that's my (our) fault. Whatever. The point is, if you haven't read everything of his already, pay attention first to the first half of his career. That's where the majority of the gold lies. At that point, you'll be so hooked on him, you'll want to read this one anyway, even though there's a fair amount of reviews telling you it's not so great.
Rating:
Summary: A Beautiful Meditation on Love and Longing
Review: Haruki Murakami is one of my favorite authors and Sputnik Sweetheart is certainly one of his loveliest books. A beautiful meditation on love and longing, Sputnik Sweetheart embodies Murakami's signature themes of loneliness, isolation and longing, themes that are familiar to all of his readers. I think Murakami's greatest talent (and he has many) is the cherished ability to embody the universal in his characters, and the three main characters in Sputnik Sweetheart are no exception. More "human" and less "surreal" than A Wild Sheep Chase (my personal favorite), Sputnik Sweetheart is not quite as straightforward as Norwegian Wood, nor is it as dense and convoluted as The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle. It is, however, filled with depth and beauty. Anyone who believes this is a "light" Murakami novel is definitely missing something. Murakami tells this beautiful story in his characteristic flat, deadpan tone, all of which adds to the book's charm. I really felt I had become a part of the narrator's world and the pages just flew by. I would have loved it had the book been twice as long, but Murakami never commits the sin of overwriting. Sputnik Sweetheart is a wonderful choice to begin reading Murakami's works. Poignant, sad, joyous, beautiful, Sputnik Sweetheart explores the depths of feeling and possibility inherent in almost all of us.
Rating:
Summary: All About Loneliness
Review: Lately all Murakami seems to be writing about is a love triangle, or maybe it just seems that way. The last I read was Norwegian Wood, which was a love triangle. And wasn't South of the Border, West of the Sun offer some kind of a triangle? And I'd read an excerpt of this novel in The New Yorker earlier in the year, titled, "Man-Eating Cats." I thought it was pretty bad. So as you can see, I had my biases going into the book. And for the first fifty pages or so, it was Murakami on repeat -- the same nonchalant male narrator, the same quirky female character...but then something happened. As usual, I fell into his story big time. It's not a bad story at all, and as he tells it, Murakami addresses a very prevalent theme: loneliness. This book is about all forms of loneliness, irreparable, irretrievable loneliness. My favorite Murakami is Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World, and this one doesn't come close. I'd rank it right around those other two books of his I mentioned in the beginning of this review.
Rating:
Summary: I'm waiting for another Windup bird
Review: Teased by several stories in the New Yorker, I purchased "The Wind-up Bird Chronicle" in 1998 and was blown away. The combination of average guy, difficult circumstances, and a Japanese take on magic realism was a potent one. This book is not as good. It's interesting, but not something that would make you immediately read everything the author had written. I'd put it third after Wind Up and Norwegian Wood, but my scale is skewed because Wind Up is a masterpiece that takes up the first five places of my 1-10 ranking. Good Murakami, and he's very good; but nothing like his best.
Rating:
Summary: a tender spin on a philosophical theme
Review: To some extent, all Murakami's books are tightly structured along a philosophical theme (i.e. life and death in Norwegian Wood, conscious and subconscious in Hard-boiled Wonderland, and despair and action in Dance Dance Dance), but in Sputnik Sweetheart he goes into a territory less universal - sign and symbol, idea and spirit, and presence and absence. I used to see Murakami as a philosophical novelist, but now I feel like I'm reading a novel written by a philosopher. The storyline is only a cover for Murakami to unfold his reflections on these themes - Sumire was swept by her love for an otherworldly woman; meanwhile, the earthier "I"(is he yet again nameless?) quietly awaits her love. It's his discussion on the contradictory forces behind these characters that makes Sputnik Sweetheart an intriguing read: Sumire was named after a Mozart's song with the most beautiful music and the most callous lyrics; Miu is a foreigner who can no longer speak her mother tongue; "I" is a passionate, kind, intelligent teacher, who nonetheless sleeps with the mother of one of his pupils. All of them feel the force of destiny, and each answers in one's own way: Sumire disappears after her quest for heavenly beauty; Miu is no longer a living person, but a memorial to the person she was, just like the statue of her father. "I" remains in this world, resists, and hangs on to a thread of hope that nobody else would call hope. All three are aware that they need some fresh blood - the spirit - to revitalize their being - the white bones. Murakami's approach is even more abstract and conceptual here than before, and it enables him to hit some sublime emotional notes, for example, the horrid scene when Miu watchs her own rape, and the final scene when "I" waits for Sumire to call back. The pain was so pure and transcendental - Murakami definitely spills some blood over the white bones here! The prose is absolutely stunning: it flows like a piece of music, with tones and colors and subtle emotions, even a bit serene sloppiness. Hat off to the translators.
Rating:
Summary: Surreal...very Murakami
Review: Sputnik Sweetheart is a very good read if you're interested in Murakami. However, I think that this book pales in comparison to his other works.
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