Due to his uncanny abilities, he has found part-time work in his old age as a finder of lost cats. The even-numbered chapters tell Nakata's story. There he spends his days reading the unabridged Richard Francis Burton translation of One Thousand and One Nights and the collected works of Natsume Soseki until the police begin inquiring after him in connection with a brutal murder. After a series of adventures, he finds shelter in a quiet, private library in Takamatsu, run by the distant and aloof Miss Saeki and the intelligent and more welcoming Oshima. The odd-numbered chapters tell the 15-year-old Kafka’s story as he runs away from his father's house to escape an Oedipal curse and to embark upon a quest to find his mother and sister. It's hard to explain, but that's the kind of novel I set out to write.”Ĭomprising two distinct but interrelated plots, the narrative runs back and forth between both plots, taking up each plotline in alternating chapters. To put it another way, the riddles function as part of the solution. And the form this solution takes will be different for each reader. Instead, several of these riddles combine, and through their interaction the possibility of a solution takes shape. In an interview posted on his English language website, Murakami says that the secret to understanding this complex novel lies in reading it several times: “Kafka on the Shore contains several riddles, but there aren't any solutions provided.

Kafka on the shore price