Kafka on the Sho r e follows the fo r tunes of two remarkable characters. Kafka Tamura runs away fr om home at fifteen, under the shadow of his father's dark prophesy. The aging Nakata, tracker of lost cats, who never recovered fr om a bizarre childhood affliction, finds his pleasantly simplified life suddenly turned upside down. Their parallel odysseys are enriched throughout by vivid accomplices a nd mesmerising dramas. Cats converse with people, fish tumble fr om the sky, a ghostlike pimp deploys a Hegel-spouting girl of the night, a fo r est harbours soldiers apparently un-aged since WWII. There is a savage killing, but the identity of both victim a nd killer is a riddle. Murakami's new novel is at once a classic tale of quest, but it is also a bold explo r ation of mythic a nd contempo r ary taboos, of patricide, of mother-love, of sister-love. Above all it is an entertainment of a very high o r der.