And another thing - this comment caught my attention because I feel exactly opposite:
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Originally Posted by Cadaverous Pallor
I was thinking about the "other" world and how unsubstantial it seemed. Often in stories when you have an other world it is more developed and understood. There's no full explanation in this book for the other world and it's much more dreamlike and vague.
I can't say that I like this idea as much as other concepts in the book. It leads me to feel unsatisifed with it. It seems almost lazy to me in retrospect, as if the whole concept could be described in one sentence: "There's this other world, and it's like a hotel, but you don't see faces, and Kumiko is represented by the woman in the bed, and the other people are just kinda there." It felt weak after the length of build-up, even though it does bring about an end to the story.
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Unlike a Tolkien or Rowlings, I don't think Murakami set out to create an "other" world with complex rules, histories, and mythologies - rather it is this vague other that remains almost erily ambiguous - there are no rules to pin things on, you just have to ride with the flow of experiences as Toru does and draw conclusions from your intuition rather than your intellect. I loved that aspect of the book, but I can easily see how someone else might not.