Norwegian Wood

Set in late-1960s Tokyo, as student protests challenge the established order, Haruki Murakami's novel is narrated by Toru Watanabe, who looks back on his years as a college student. Quiet and serious, Toru is devoted to Naoko, a beautiful and emotionally fragile young woman, though the bond between them is shadowed by the death of their closest friend years before. Toru also knows Midori, an outgoing and lively classmate. The title comes from the Beatles song, Naoko's favorite, and Murakami drew the first section from an earlier short story, Firefly. The novel was hugely popular with young Japanese readers and was filmed in 2010 by Tran Anh Hung.

ReCactus founder Bernard Tan named it among the novels he counts himself a fan of, in an interview about how reading connects him with people.