Sputnik Sweetheart
I like to read books. They are a great source of knowledge. Every time I start reading a book I am all geared up and full of energy to go through the roller-coaster of different emotions, feelings and reactions that a book has to offer, along with knowledge I was unaware of.
In this book as well, I learnt number of things from music to authors and of course, the interesting relationship dynamics that exists among the characters of this story. Just like Sumire's work could make K feel every emotion that she wrote about, I could also feel every emotion that Murakami so beautifully wrote.
But here comes a not-so-interesting twist. I like to read a book and then I like to finish it. I feel peaceful every time I finish a book. It's a good feeling of having completed a story that was running in your mind since you started reading the respective book. But this book left me restless. Not restless. Fucked up. reason being, I couldn't decipher the end. I don't know if Sumire was really aliv
e or K was just lucid dreaming. If Miu actually killed Sumire for revenge or K raped her. If the book had ended on the note of Sumire remaining missing or even if she had died, I would have peacefully bidden adieu to this book. But none of it happened. So I am restless and writing about it now is making me more restless.
In conclusion, I want to acknowledge that I feel sad and restless because the end is not clear and I am in no mood of making up a facade end and live in my dreamland. My conscience is not allowing me to go about it. I hope in near future I stumble upon a review which would enlighten me about the end of this story and I would finally be able to 'read' in peace.
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I have just finished reading the book in Danish (I am from Denmark) and I really liked it! I did have a hard time relating to the characters and the first half of the book was just boring. I did not like his way of telling this "all-consuming love". I think it is because It didn't seem like love to me but more like an infatuation.
**Spoiler from now on**
I loved the ending though! I thought the scene up in the ferris wheel was so exciting. It was there I realised that the message in the book was about loneliness and emptiness. Miu sees herself with Ferdinando having intercourse. I don't interpret this as an actual thing happening. Murakami describes Ferdinando as a mystical person that as a shadow like character to him who follows. I think Ferdinando was the embodiment of the emptiness and loneliness she felt inside and that her having intercourse with him was an allegory of her internalising and becomes one with emptiness.
The intercourse is also described very oddly. On one hand Murakami describes it as consensual because she takes part in the intercourse willingly. On the other hand he also describes Ferdinando humiliating her and mistreating her. To me this is definitely an allegory. I think this explanation makes good sense considering how summer disappeared. She disappeared after being rejected by Miu. I think it was then she truly realised that she was alone like a sputnik.
This book made a big impression of me because I could relate to the feeling of emptiness. I have searched online on reviews and I have noticed how every reader who did not like the book never talk about the ferris wheel scene. To me that was most important part of the book.
I am giving it 4 out of 5 stars. It was a brilliant book but there were too many loose ends at the end of the book.
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