This has been on my reading list for years and I do kind of wish I had read this when I was younger and more susceptible to the themes of this book because unfortunately now, as a jaded 24 year old, I can only find the characters (especially the protagonist) immensely irritating. The female characters in this book solely exist to prop up the male protagonist's ego and teach him life lessons. The protagonist regularly calls himself an ordinary, boring guy, yet so many of the female characters are immediately in awe of him because he reads The Great Gatsby and apparently says such interesting and amazing things and immediately want to throw themselves at him, only fulfilling his needs and disregarding their own. The only redeeming aspect of this dynamic is that the protagonist is so boring himself that it is easier to get more invested in the dramatic stories of the women he encounters. The obsession with sex in the novel is off-putting and would remove the impact of an emotional scene or character development. Thankfully, Murakami's writing (and Jay Rubin's translation of it) was compelling enough to keep me invested and not turned off, but the characters and their dynamics with the protagonist put me off entirely.