2025/003: number9dream — David Mitchell

2025/003: number9dream — David Mitchell

The fortress-grey mountain-faces, the green river snaking out of the gorge, the hanging bridge, mishmash of roofs and power lines, port, timber yards, school soccer ground, gravel pit, Uncle Orange’s tea-fields, our secret beach, its foot rock, waves breaking on the shoals around the whalestone, the long island of Tanegashima where they launch satellites, glockenspiel clouds, the envelope where the sea seals the sky. [p. 45]

Eiji Miyake is twenty years old and has grown up in rural Japan: the novel opens with his arrival in Tokyo, in search of his father. Eight chapters later, he's made contact with a parent, witnessed some appalling violence, fallen in love, benefitted from the kindnesses of others, and had (or dreamt) a conversation with John Lennon about the song 'Number Nine Dream'.

It's fair to say that number9dream is something of an emotional rollercoaster.( Read more... )