Patti Smith Reviews Haruki Murakami’s New Novel, Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and His Years of Pilgrimage

Haru­ki Murakami’s 13th nov­el, Col­or­less Tsuku­ru Taza­ki and His Years of Pil­grim­age: A Nov­el, was first pub­lished last April in Japan, and, with­in the first month, it sold one mil­lion copies. This week, the nov­el (trans­lat­ed by Philip Gabriel) final­ly arrives in book­stores in the U.S. If you’re won­der­ing where this nov­el will take read­ers, you can read an excerpt of Murakami’s nov­el recent­ly pub­lished in Slate, and then Pat­ti Smith’s book review in The New York Times. Smith, the “God­moth­er of Punk,” won the Nation­al Book Award for her 2010 mem­oir Just Kids. She knows some­thing about writ­ing, and she’s clear­ly no stranger to Murakami’s body of work. While plan­ning to go on tour, Smith once won­dered what books to take along, and wrote on her per­son­al web site:

The worse part, besides say­ing good­bye to my daugh­ter Jesse, is pick­ing out what books to take. I decide this will be essen­tial­ly a Haru­ki Muraka­mi tour. So I will take sev­er­al of his books includ­ing the three vol­ume IQ84 to reread. He is a good writer to reread as he sets your mind to day­dream­ing while you are read­ing him. thus i always miss stuff.

Smith’s review of Murakami’s lat­est begins here. The book itself can be pur­chased online at Ama­zon, iTunes, or at your favorite book­store.

h/t @holdengraber

Relat­ed Con­tent:

In Search of Haru­ki Muraka­mi: A Doc­u­men­tary Intro­duc­tion to Japan’s Great Post­mod­ernist Nov­el­ist

Haru­ki Murakami’s Pas­sion for Jazz: Dis­cov­er the Novelist’s Jazz Playlist, Jazz Essay & Jazz Bar

Haru­ki Muraka­mi Trans­lates The Great Gats­by, the Nov­el That Influ­enced Him Most

Watch Pat­ti Smith Read from Vir­ginia Woolf, and Hear the Only Sur­viv­ing Record­ing of Woolf’s Voice

Pat­ti Smith’s Cov­er of Nirvana’s “Smells Like Teen Spir­it” Strips the Song Down to its Heart