It took me about two weeks to finish reading Killing Commendatore and maybe if this wasn't a Murakami book I'd just say 'fuck it' and give it up after the first week. In a way I actually enjoyed taking my time reading this and be immersed in this world with these enigmatic characters. For me this is not the kind of book where I can just simply get in and get out of in the matter of days. It has that suspense and slow build which somehow felt better to prolong because I felt like I was being taken somewhere by the author, like he's telling me 'calm down, just listen because I'm about to tell you something' and that was definitely the case with most of his previous books that I've read and that's why I waited. However, with this one.. the wait didn't get anywhere. It was building up to something but that something never came. The ending felt somewhat incomplete and I can't help but feel disappointed. Where were we supposed to go? What were any of those things supposed to lead up to? I don't think we ever arrived to a satisfactory destination and I'm just confused as hell at this point because we spent such a big chunk of the book getting to know this mysterious Menshiki, Mariye, the Commendatore etc. and for the ending to not have anything to do with those characters is just... I mean I guess it was a choice?? We don't even get to see the unnamed protagonist's growth per se as a character or as an artist and it makes me think, 'then what the fuck is the point of this book?'
I also found that the older I get the more uncomfortable I am with how Murakami describes women and girls to the point that whenever I get to those parts of his books I'm always reminded of that one Tumblr post that shows an example of how male writers write about women and it's comically on point because they somehow can always manage to reduce women's personality and entire existence to one single thing only: boobs.
Overall I didn't hate this book up till the middle, then it got really repetitive and it led up to a disappointing ending hence why I rated it 2.5/5.