El fin del mundo y un despiadado país de las maravillas

Two stories alternate in this novel. In the first, a nameless calcutec, a human data-scrambler working for a state-run System, is hired by an eccentric scientist whose research plants a hidden switch inside his mind. In the second, a man arrives in a walled Town, where he is separated from his shadow and assigned to read old dreams from the skulls of unicorns, while the shadow urges him to escape before winter. Murakami gradually reveals how the two worlds connect, and the consequences of that connection for the narrator's sense of self.

Choose this if you enjoy puzzle-box narratives and surreal fiction with a philosophical bent. It is among Murakami's most inventive books and offers an early version of the mix of noir and fable he later perfected.

Deep, inward-looking, open-ended and thought-provoking; a moderate read.

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