Number9Dream by David Mitchell

Back Cover Synopsis: You've read Dickens or Salinger, and you think of adolescence in terms of a "coming-of-age story." So does Eiji Miyake. It would be nice to think he's right: his mom isn't much in the picture, his beloved sister has died in an accident, and picking fruit and living with Grandma on an outer island of Japan give Eiji a lot of time to fantasize abotu what might happen if he were to be united with the wealthy father he's never known. At twenty, Eiji comes to Tokyo to find him. But what should be a straightforward quest turns into something far more strange when Eiji stumbles upon the hidden power centers of the Japanese underworld. Suddenly the riddle of his father's identity is the least of his worries. What do survival, the nature of dreams, and the number 9 have to do with one another? It's no small question for a provincial boy with a priceon his head and only the cost of a John Lennon album to his name.


I just finished this last night and am still wondering about it. It's very interesting. The beginning starts out completely confusing and throughout the book you wonder which parts are real and which are dreams. There are a few graphic parts, some sexual and some just gross, but I was compelled to keep reading because I wanted to know if he found his father. I like it because although it seemed like it was just a boy trying to find his dad, he was finding himself throughout it, and there were so many times that these bad things just kept happening you felt so bad. It made me angry how people used his gullibility and eagerness to find his dad to trick him into things. So many emotions! The whole Japanese mob/underworld storyline was very outrageous, at first I thought it was all dreams but then you realize it's not, it's really happening this way. There's so many twists and turns and randomness which definately keeps you awake.

I didn't really like the ending though, it was so open-ended, like your TV series finale where someone gets shot and you don't know who or by whom and you have to wait for the next season, although there's nothing to wait for here, it just ends. He finally seems happy and things are ok, he's accepting things the way they are and then there's an earthquake and he's just left wondering how all these different people are. I think it's supposed to show how he's grown and evolved and all the people that he cares about and who care about him despite the hard times he's had and how although his dad seemed like the focal point of his life for so long it didn't have to be that way. So in that light, it was a good ending despite being left hanging :)