Reviews with content warning for Sexual assault - 1Q84

A book that is terrible for people who like the 'proper' traditional format- clear climax, all questions answered. But for those who don't mind the strange and fantastical nature, it is perfect. All common criticisms with Murakami are still found valid in this book, yet the dreamlike quality is once again perfected. I loved both Tengo's and Aomame's (and Ushikawa's in book 3) perspective chapters.
SPOILERS AHEAD FOR ENDING
The final book spoke about Chekhov's gun being unfired, which is true both metaphorically and literally- Aomame never shoots the Heckler & Kock, and there is no 'final showdown' between the characters and Sakigake, or any shocking revelation. Although some of this would have been good, I find that the strange nature of his books excuses this, and it works very well.

Content Warnings

kaitlyn_avecado's review against another edition

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challenging hopeful mysterious slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? Yes

3.75

I wish it was at least 300 pages shorter. 1st book of his I've read. Clear writing style, but it's also hard to hold attention. Extremely detailed and quotidian, but mysterious and interesting too.

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chrisljm's review against another edition

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challenging dark mysterious sad slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? N/A

1.0

I have so many things to say (all negative) but I’m gonna try my best to not make this too long lol. But this book was so goddamn long and boring. Starting this book was so hard, it took me about 3 weeks just to read 300~ pages and I’m usually a pretty fast reader. I had to switch to the audiobook because I just couldn’t get through the book otherwise. The audiobook definitely made the book easier to read but it also made it worse because it vocalized and brought to life these characters who were pretty insufferable in my opinion.

No wonder this book was originally released in three parts because I genuinely don’t think there is any reason this book should’ve been 1500+ pages (ebook) long. It definitely could’ve been reduced a third of its length because there were parts that were so lengthy and repetitive, and just dragged on for seemingly forever. There was a whole ass scene where the narrator went over the complete instructions of how a pregnancy test worked, what the results shown meant, as well as the science behind it. I think if just the sentences that mention breasts were cut out, that alone could reduce the book by at least 1-2 chapters. (After a quick ctrl+f, breasts were mentioned an astounding 77 times)!

I’ve heard plenty of times before that Murakami is terrible at writing women, but he’s genuinely so terrible at it that I can’t even get mad. In my opinion he should just stop including female characters in his books completely. And if he wanted to have a romance arch, he should just consider having those characters be gay, because writing this sentence, “Aomame mourned the deaths of these two friends deeply. It saddened her to think that these women were forever gone from the world. And she mourned their lovely breasts—breasts that had vanished without a trace.” is insane to me.

The book also contained so many content warnings. Literally any tw you can think of, it’s most likely included. Luckily, I’m not adverse to reading things that contain content warnings, for the most part, but the stuff in this book definitely made me uncomfortable. And if you’re someone who hates sexual assault being used as a plot device, definitely don’t read this.

And since I’m on the topic of content warnings, the one that I sensed from the beginning was an adult minor relationship. I also just want to point out that an adult talking about a minor’s chest and ‘beautiful curves’ is already disgusting, but it doesn’t cancel out just because he throws in that there is no sexual meaning. However, out of all the foul parts I read (there were many) the one that was the most revolting to me was a scene where these two characters found themselves waking up naked together and there was a descriptive contrast made where one of the things being compared was referred to as ‘adult penis’. I’m sure you can guess what the opposite thing being described was. Having to read that full scene made me want to die.

There were so many times throughout the book where I wanted to dnf, because I have truly never disliked a book more than this one. But above all, more than disliking this book, I am a hater, and so I finished it even though I wanted to unalive myself the whole time, so that I could properly write this review.

TLDR:
Badly written female characters
Too many mentions of breasts
CW: adult minor relationship, sexual assault/rape as a plot device, incesty (mommy issues), suicide, sex scenes
Unnecessary sex scenes
Long and boring

Content Warnings

j_abby's review against another edition

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dark mysterious reflective slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

1.75

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