Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and His Years of Pilgrimage

Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and His Years of Pilgrimage by Haruki Murakami, translated from the Japanese by Philip Gabriel, audio read by Bruce Locke, 386 pages.
Similar in tone to the author's 1Q84, though lacking the slipstream (is that still a genre-blending term?) qualities of that massive book.
Tazaki is part of a group of five friends; they are all but inseparable throughout high school. When Tazaki leaves their hometown to attend university in Tokyo, everything changes: he is banished from the group, but no one will tell him why. This banishment causes profound changes in his life , and Tsukuru is left to live out a rather lonely existence. Sixteen years pass before circumstances cause Tsukuru to seek answers and find some sort of resolution. Deftly handled, and quietly engaging.
Murakami is among the best.
Why would you not give this man a Nobel Prize for Literature?