Number9Dream (2001)

Strange, funny, clever, moving, and a bit surreal. Generally Mitchell is fantastic, but each of his books has something that bugs me. In this one, he's trying a little too hard to out-Murakami Murakami, and to show off just how much he knows about the weird and wacky (from a Western perspective) stuff he knows about Japanese culture. But if you can get past that, it's a great read. ( )

sci-fi/fantasy/surrealist mystery. Vivid prose ("A galaxy of cream unribbons in my coffee cup, and the background chatter pulls into focus") from an unreliable narrator who appears to be on some kind of psychoactive drug. I don't know what his deal is, and will likely never know, because his story--however beautifully told--keeps leaping out onto bizarre tangents that always turn out to be mere tangents. I liked Mitchell's Cloud Atlas alright but this was entirely too much work. ( )

It's not as dazzling as Cloud Atlas or as, well, perfect as The Thousand Autumns of Jacob deZoet, but this is a solid book. Mitchell hasn't disappointed me yet. ( )

Flawed but has several flashes of brilliance, particularly near the beginning. ( )

I have previously read Mitchell's first and latest books (Ghostwritten and Bone Clocks) and enjoyed them so much that I started going though his other works. Number9dream is his second book. While there are flashes of brilliance, it is not up to the level of the others - I wonder if this was due to pressure on a new writer to deliver a follow-up to Ghostwritten?
The opening to this book reminds me of Ghostwritten - great verve and flair, but it is not sustained. While there are well crafted characters, and the beginnings of a theme, the plot is inconsistent, and you get the feeling that the book was started before the author knew where it would end.
I'm glad I read it, and a not-so-good Mitchell book is still better than most of the dross out there, but I'm now looking forward to his later, and hopefully better crafted, books. ( )