I read Dance, Dance, Dance before A Wild Sheep Chase. If this was a mistake, I don’t know, but I must say that it made for some humorous thoughts. Dance, Dance, Dance is regarded as a stand-alone novel, but there are definite connections to A Wild Sheep Chase.
Some thoughts I had while reading Dance, Dance, Dance:
“What is the Dolphin Hotel?”
“Kiki….? Who?”
“what”
“Who is the Sheep Professor?”
“Sheep Man…..?”
“Who is the Rat? Does it even matter since he’s dead?”
“what”
So it was a little difficult to read fluidly, but was still a good book regardless. I read it over my winter break from school, which was excellent because the exposition takes place during the winter season.
A Wild Sheep Chase is actually the third book in Murakami’s Rat Trilogy, but again, it functions as a separate piece as well. There are still some details that I feel would read more smoothly with prior reading of Hear the Wind Sing and Pinball, 1973. A Wild Sheep Chase was definitely weirder than Dance, Dance, Dance, but I also felt that it was slower in its plot development ( that is, until death and explosions came in). Both books have humor, but I felt that A Wild Sheep Chase overall had more humorous writing. There were several odd funny parts, as well as comedically blunt chapter titles. For example, “We are not whales - and this constitutes one great theme underscoring our sex life” in the chapter “The Whale’s Penis and the Woman with Three Occupations”. The books have a funny sort of dynamic between them. Whether this is intentional or just me being goofy, I don’t know. For example, I was thinking about the presence of death in both, and decided A Wild Sheep Chase is like “Dude, I’m dead,” while Dance, Dance, Dance is more like “Dude, you’re dead…who’s next?”
I plan to read the first two pieces in this series, Hear the Wind Sing and Pinball, 1973 after Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and Sputnik Sweetheart.
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