? The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle

Haruki Murakami (1994)

This labyrinthine and hallucinogenic novel gets going when Toru Okada's cat disappears in suburban Tokyo. He consults a pair of psychic sisters who appear to him in dreams and reality. Although Murakami's plot meanders, it never loses its pace or humanity.

? Spring Snow

[Photo/China Daily]

Yukio Mishima (1969-71)

Before committing ritual suicide in November 1970, Mishima posted this tetralogy of novels to his publisher. It's a saga of 20th-century Japan, in which a law student imagines a school friend constantly reincarnated.

? Midnight's Children

Salman Rushdie (1980)

Magic realism meets postcolonial India in the ambitious, colorful and clever novel that was awarded the "Booker of Bookers" Prize.