Reviews with content warning for Trafficking - Pachinko

Reviews tagging 'Trafficking'

Pachinko by Min Jin Lee

44 reviews

madeline_schmidt20's review against another edition

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dark emotional reflective sad tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

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dee_dreams's review against another edition

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informative reflective sad slow-paced

Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

1.5

Pachinko started out with an interesting premise. I felt invested in this family drama. But about halfway in, I felt like I was tricked into reading a cheap, emotionally-manipulative soap opera.

Instead of whining about what I disliked, which is a lot, I wanted to be constructive and offer some lessons I took away instead.

When characters die or disappear, it should matter. The characters who knew the dead person should care on some level (even if it's shallow or self-serving.)

The more characters you kill off, the less empathy the reader will feel for random new characters that are introduced.

Misery is not the same as depth. Trauma is not the end of the story. Focus on the characters' humanity rather than their victimization.

Use writing for good. We already know that evils like misogyny, racism, ableism, and grooming exist. Don't simply portray them for trauma porn. Use your writing to challenge them and provide a different perspective. Nudge the reader towards empathy and a belief that change is possible. Nobody needs more despair.

Stop introducing random, dehumanized sex workers and then portraying graphic violence against them. It's been done to death.

If you've already described a character as "plain, unattractive, never lovely," you don't have to do it three more times. You especially don't have to make the sexist, male-gazey descriptions more disparaging as she ages.

Don't try to take on a huge amount of unrelated themes. Or, do - just decide to make it a collection of short stories, rather than a novel. And follow up on those themes.

Last but not least, think about whether or not a "family saga" spanning 4 generations really needs a chapter about a minor character, unrelated to any members of said family, discovering pansexual orgies in the forest during the Summer of Love. And if you decide, yes, it does, make it hot. Please.

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rit's review against another edition

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informative inspiring lighthearted reflective relaxing sad slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

This is an amazing book. The story told feels so real, it made me feel like I was there and the characters were my best friends. I felt mad, I felt happy, I felt in love and I felt sad through the history of a family during WWII. I highly recommend it, but be aware of all its trigger warnings.

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squidknees's review against another edition

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adventurous emotional funny hopeful inspiring reflective sad slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.75

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niaaaaa's review

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adventurous emotional hopeful reflective sad medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

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rieviolet's review against another edition

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emotional sad medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

The book is divided into three parts: the first one I liked well enough, the second one was so-so, the third one, well, I just kept thinking "What is going on here? What the heck am I reading about?".

There were just too many characters, especially given that the book already covers a very long period of time and many generations of a family. I really think that some characters were just unnecessary additions and we could have done without their perspectives, so that more space could be given to the main ones. All the jumping between so many different points of view just made it hard to become invested.

Moreover, very big and even traumatic events are just briefly explored or worse just mentioned in passing. This character died, this one entered a relationship , and so-and-so did that, well good for them, am I supposed to care? There is no groundwork, how can a reader get attached to these people and their stories when you as an author have given them so little? Well there was time to go on and on about George Elliot's novels but no time to delve into a main character' emotions, I guess.
I was just not a fan of how the author portrayed the characters, if there isn't a good handling of their depictions then the story just turns into an over-the-top soap opera.

I found interesting the setting and the overall theme (exploring the lives of Korean people and their descendants living in Japan) but I was not that impressed with the execution itself.

For its length, the book is quite easy to get through, the chapters are not too long, the pace is quite fast and the narrative style is readable enough. Still, the writing style is nothing much to talk about, overall it's a bit too much dry and matter-of-fact for my taste.

All in all, the premise sounded good but the book was a disappointment for me and the three-star rating is basically only for the first section, the rest I'm wilfully choosing to ignore.

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