Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and His Years of Pilgrimage by Haruki Murakami

Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and His Years of Pilgrimage by Haruki Murakami
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

A satisfying coming-of-age story with an engaging main character pursuing a life-altering mystery.

Throughout high school, Tsukuru Tazaki and his four friends, two girls and two other boys, had been a close-knit group, almost a single unit. Tsukuru, though, had felt somewhat separated from his friends, different somehow, and was grateful for his inclusion in this circle of friends. A distinction they’d all commented on from early on in their friendship had to do with their names; the Japanese meaning of all the friends’ names included a color, except for Tazaki. It meant nothing, but somehow, this made Tsukuru feel “less than” the others.

At the end of high school, the other four planned to stay in their hometown of Nagoya for college, but Tsukuru, who had always had a passion for railroad stations, dreamed of going to a university in Tokyo to study engineering and eventually designing and building them. The others supported his decision, and when the time came, off he went, returning, when he could, to reunite with the group who had remained together even as they studied in different disciplines to pursue their own dreams.

But in their sophomore year, Tsukuru came home for a visit, and, oddly, none of his friends were available to take his calls or get together. His requests for return calls went unanswered. When he finally got one of the four on the phone, he was coldly told that they didn’t want anything to do with Tsukuru ever again, to stop calling and that all the others felt the same way. Completely blind-sided, hurt, and baffled, Tsukuru returned to Tokyo and his studies, clueless as to why he’d been banished from his circle so abruptly. Cut adrift, Tsukuru struggled to exist, totally in the dark about what had happened.

Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and His Years of Pilgrimage was an absorbing coming-of-age story of a young man whose identity, based in part on being a member of this tight group of friends, dissolves when the circle rejects him without an explanation. I was completely drawn into his tale of being emotionally uprooted and felt his confusion especially considering the bizarre circumstances. The flow of the story is quiet and steady. It calmly traces Tsukuru’s path through his 20s and 30s. With the help of a girlfriend, he finally realizes that the continuing mystery of his inexplicable abandonment was affecting his ability to have a lasting and fulfilling relationship in his adult life. I thought it was quite courageous of Tsukuru to confront his past, returning to Nagoya after so many years and pursuing the answers he needed and deserved.

I listened to the audiobook as well as read a physical copy of the novel. The narrator of the audiobook edition, Bruce Locke, was excellent. His warm voice carried me along, and he expertly altered his voice to represent the different characters, men and women.

The book leaves the reader with questions still on the table and has an ending that leaves you wondering about Tsukuru’s future. But with the big mystery of the story solved, I was still satisfied with being left without all the answers.


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