While readers leaving comments have posted their own corrections about the issue, Amazon has put up no official explanation of what was its own mistake, leaving poor Mr. Murakami with a rating of only three stars, despite being #17 on Amazon's list of bestsellers.

"This kind of misinformation reflects poorly on both the author and publisher," wrote Knopf spokesperson Paul Bogaards in a refutation of a blog post on Gizmodo about the problem. "For a company that professes to have the interests of authors and readers inform the heart of their work, they need to do a better job of communicating their mistakes and instituting fixes."

The people speak.