“I just don’t get it,” was my response to reading my first Haruki Murakami, his six-story collection, After the Quake (2002), set in the aftermath of the Kobe Earthquake of 1995. Prior to reading this book–the result of a work-related book club–all I was aware of was that his novel 1Q84 (2013) was quite the sensation and is still on many’s “To Read” pile. As such, my expectations for this author were high. I quickly began to readjust my expectations, however, after reading the first […]