Surprisingly I didn't like a book from Murakami for the first time. The stories had more absurdity than I expected from Murakami. I prefer his novels over the short stories. Some stories in the book I actually loved. For example 'Sleep' was my favourite. There was so much I could rely on and the Murakami witty writing was evident there. Barn Burning, The Elephant vanishes and Family Affair were good as well. The problem for me with this collection was the incoherent of the other stories. Some were utterly boring and some were just meh. Usually I am able to relate and understand the absurdity of Murakami's stories but here I saw the lacking in such. 
I would like to give this a re-read next year.