Reviews with content warning for Rape - Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and His Years of Pilgrimage

This book follows a man who is trying to process after suddenly and without explanation being completely cut off by his most cherished friends. One day the people with whom he had been inseparable tell him they no longer wish to communicate, and he knows why. The only problem is he has absolutely no clue what he has done.

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ambivalentneb's review against another edition

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inspiring reflective sad slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.75

Hello Ash, I know you are reading this. Colorless Tsukuru was a lot different than his other works, it did not have as much as that feverish liminal feeing as in his other books, but it also felt more defined in clear meaning. I have mixed feelings about this as I love that aspect of Murakami’s books that describe dreamlike environments and symbols but having a clear definition in his own way is good as well. It felt a bit more personal to him as an author but it deviated from his style a bit, but that may just be due to him writing this at a later age.

spoilers now
no really don’t read this
tell your brain to stop automatically reading
last chance

The book follows the life of Tsukuru Takazi and the main event, the splitting of his group of friends: which is defined as a perfect quintet. He is cast away from his group suddenly and without any seeming remorse and he falls into a depression that changes him. He lives a rest of a mostly unfulfilling like until he is 36 and he finds someone he is serious about, but cannot go forward due to all of the conflicting and unresolved feelings within him from years ago, so he sets to find each member of the group and uncover the truth. I don’t want to talk about each individual encounter as this is getting long but ultimately it leads to some introspective eureka of him piecing together why the evened in his life occurred the way they have and how his feelings were not an isolated entities from the diaspora of feelings around him in others. In the end the book leads to compare his life to a subway (his occupation is building railroads) and he reales he has so many paths he could have gone yet he took none after the break of the group, so he decides to chase one last decision with all he has even if it will destroy colorless tsukuru tazaki, as even if he is colorless he has substance.

This sounded a lot better in my head, I like the book b it definitely not in the same regard as his other books or as much. (Why am I like this :skull:)
It was also reminiscent of coming of age stories but it wasn’t cringe so that’s fine.

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benwagnerphotos's review against another edition

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dark mysterious sad medium-paced

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

4.75

Murakami’s most underrated novel. This one blew me away and I’ll be thinking about it for a long time.

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mysticmoth's review against another edition

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Loveable characters? No

1.5

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mixuchi's review against another edition

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emotional mysterious reflective sad medium-paced

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

2.75

If the women and sexual scenes had not been written this way, my rating would've been higher. I actually did not mind the ending for what it was, even though people do not like open-ended endings. I really thought the random story about a guy having only a month to live and being able to see these colors would go anywhere.

I also wonder what happened to Haida and I wished it was more explored and not left the way it was.

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whatdidshedraw's review against another edition

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dark emotional reflective sad medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

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saintslimeburger's review against another edition

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dark emotional mysterious reflective slow-paced

5.0

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cobhlaith's review against another edition

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emotional sad slow-paced

4.5

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