Junpei fills the void and is eventually told by Takatsuki that he should marry Sayoko; Junpei is unsure regarding whether it is the right thing to do. Ushers the reader into a hallucinatory world where where dreams and real-life nightmares are impossible to tell apart.

Of course, the leif motif that gives rise to it is the 1995 Kobe earthquake that left open wounds in the Japanese imagery for the decades to come.The earthquake is peripheral to each story at best and yet there is something decidedly central about its occurrence.

Two months later, on March 20, during rush hour, members of the apocalyptic religious cult Aum Shinrikyo placed bags of sarin gas on the major subway lines in Tokyo. Haruki Murakami, the leading Japanese author, has a cult following, and all his fans have been waiting for the premiere recording of "After the Quake". That evening, while transferring between subway lines to get home, he sees a man in his mid-fifties who has a missing earlobe and decides to follow him surreptitiously. This is the twelfth book I have read by Murakami and at this point you could probably say that I am quite invested in the author. After the Quake doesn't chronicle the events of the earthquake, although all its stories have a vague connection to the disaster.

First published in Japan in 2000, it was released in English as after the quake in 2002 (translator Jay Rubin notes that Murakami "insisted" the title "should be all lower-case"). Since childhood, Murakami has been heavily influenced by Western culture, particularly Western music and literature. All of the stories are set in February 1995, the month between the Kobe earthquake and the Tokyo gas attacks. Even so, ATQ is distinct, with its focus on a suddenly denuded Japan after the quake and subway attack, when there was no longer any distinction between above and below the surface.

Yoshiya is born to an eccentric single mother who is 'born again' after several unfortunate couplings.Yoshiya lives with his mother, who has recently been away helping her religious group provide earthquake relief. As always with Murakami there are themes of love and loss, solitude and friendship and some of the stories include surreal moments which seem entirely believable when you are reading them.