A book that encourages staying up all night – After Dark

When I was younger I loved staying up all night reading. We would go to the library Friday evenings and I would make it my mission to finish a book before I went to sleep. Often that meant I was fighting heavy eyes at 1am  and had the worst time in the world getting up the next day for Netball, but for me there was something about being lost in a book when everyone else was sleeping.

As I got older this became much harder to do. For one thing I love sleep and have a better understanding of how difficult it is to function when you haven’t had any. I am also married now and share a bed with someone who doesn’t appreciate staying up reading and will complain as I turn pages and leave the light on (fair complaints mind you). Every ow and then though I  have trouble sleeping and will get up with my book to once again stay up until the early hours until it’s done. I am an all or nothing kind of person and it’s a problem.

Last night I started reading ‘After Dark’ by Haruki Murakami around 11pm and quickly knew I would have to finish it before bed. The story is meant ot be read in the middle of the night as it follows a young girl, Mari, between the hours of 12pm – 7 am. Mari is drinking coffee and reading in a Denny’s when she runs into an old friend of her sister, Eri who is eager to talk to her. From here she becomes involved in an argument between a prostitute and a businessman and the story begins to follow different characters and what they do while the world is sleeping. There is no major drama in the plot, for example we never find out what happens to the man who assaulted the prostitute although it is clear he has pissed of the Chinese mob who sell her, instead the book is more of a snapshot of a typical Toyko night. The mundane things that happen are made slightly unsettling when we know it’s the middle of the night, and reading the book when everyone else is asleep really added to the ambiance. To be honest I think I wouldn’t have enjoyed the story as much if I had read it during the day, so I am encouraging everyone to stay up late with this one.

As it’s Murakami you expect a little weirdness, and we do get it with the story of the sister who is asleep in her bed before suddenly being pulled into the TV set in her room. However for the author this is pretty simple and I would go as far as to say it is Murakami’s most ‘normal’ book, by which I mean there is no hint of science-fiction or fantasy elements. Come to think of it there isn’t even a talking cat.

‘After Dark’ is a beautifully written story which tells an everyday night in the most compelling way. I loved being able to relate to the way the world becomes slightly more unnerving at that time and how conversations suddenly become deeper and more serious. But most of all I loved how it transported me to Japan and made me feel like I was staying up late in a small Toyko neighborhood.