Description

First American PublicationThis stunning and elegiac novel by the writer of the internationally-acclaimed wind up Bird Chronicle has sold more than 4 million copies in Japan and is currently open to American readers for the first time.  It will certainly be considered a fictional event.Toru, a quiet and preternaturally serious young university student in Tokyo, is dedicated to Naoko, an attractive and introspective young woman, but their mutual love is marked by the tragic death of the closest friend decades before.  Toru starts to adjust to university life and the loneliness and isolation he encounters there, but Naoko sees the demands and duties of existence unbearable.  As she retreats further into her very own world, Toru finds himself contacting others and attracted to a very independent and sexually liberated young woman.A touching story of 1 university student's romantic coming-of-age, Norwegian Wood takes us to that particular distant host to a young man's first, hopeless, and brave love.