Mari crosses paths with a retired female wrestler, Kaoru, now working as a manager in a love hotel called "Alphaville".

Parts of the story take place in a world between reality and dream, and each chapter begins with an image of a clock depicting the passage of time throughout the night.

Such strong symbols as music, night, light, cameras and not working television are used, and the author leaves it to his readers to interpret them in one way or another.

[4] Walter Kirn, for The New York Times, lauded Murakami's ability to take a birds-eye view of his nightly world: "Standing sentry above the common gloom, Murakami detects phosphorescence everywhere, but chiefly in the auras around people, which glow brightest at night and when combined but fade at dawn, when we go our separate ways.

"[5] Steven Poole, in The Guardian, appreciated the book's style: "After Dark is perhaps the closest Murakami has yet come to composing a pure tone-poem ... Exposition is set to the minimum, while the mood-colouring is virtuosic.