Equal parts training log, travelogue, and reminiscence, this revealing memoir covers his four-month preparation for the 2005 New York City Marathon. Settings range from Tokyo, where he once shared the course with an Olympian, to the Charles River in Boston among young women who outpace him. Through this marvelous lens of sport emerges a cornucopia of memories and insights: the eureka moment when he decided to become a writer, his triumphs and disappointments, his passion for vintage LPs, and the experience, after fifty, of having seen his race times improve and then fall back.
The bestselling author of wildly imaginative novels like THE WIND-UP BIRD CHRONICLE here muses "in real time" about his sport and hobby, long-distance running. While Murakami writes that he worked over the text, it seems starkly unself-conscious (or poorly translated)--as when he talks about shining his running shoes. And yet this lack of guardedness as presented in Ray Porter's forthright and relaxed voice gives the book rare bite. Murakami isn't pushing his running, or his prose. "It doesn't matter what field you're talking about, beating somebody else just doesn't do it for me." If Murakami had a point to make, or if Porter had tried harder--had embellished the text or reached for an accent--this recording would fail. Instead it succeeds brilliantly. No secrets here, just the companionship of a dazzling intellect. B.H.C. (c) AudioFile 2008, Portland, Maine
Boston Globe...
"Murakami’s power to imagine is breathtaking."
About the Author
HARUKI MURAKAMI was born in Kyoto in 1949 and now lives near Tokyo. His work has been translated into forty-two languages. The most recent of his many honors is the Franz Kafka Prize.
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What I Talk About When I Talk About Running
by Haruki Murakami
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