Reviews tagging 'Physical abuse'

Audition by Ryū Murakami

14 reviews

mossroot's review against another edition

dark emotional mysterious reflective sad tense medium-paced

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

4.75

Audition is the second book by Ryu Murakami that I have read. Having started with Piercing, Audition was a bit slower paced. However, once it gets into the horror, it is so visceral and well described that it feels like a hot iron down your throat. 

I've seen some complaints about the ending, but personally I believe it fits so well with the characters and is a really good example of the characterization that Murakami uses. 

I really think the ending shows Aoyama finally being broken from his delusional point of view. The spell has truly broken and he sees in her what everyone else has seen the entire time.

Audition took me about two hours to finish. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Abandonment, Torture, Gore, Animal death, Alcohol, Child abuse, Domestic abuse, Murder, Terminal illness, Blood, Violence, Injury/Injury detail, Sexual content, Emotional abuse, Death, Animal cruelty, Physical abuse, Pedophilia, Sexual assault, and Toxic relationship

Moderate: Death of parent and Gaslighting

cronasbookshelf's review against another edition

dark mysterious tense slow-paced

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

2.5

for the first half of the book, the story was actually pretty interesting and i liked it, but then the second half was just terrible, the pacing was off, the sex scene was awkward and disgusting,

the plot twist of asami being a murderer wasn't at all developed, she just killed the dog and tried to kill aoyama, also i never understood why she wanted to kill him in the first place, plus the whole murder scene was underwhelming, it wasn't scary, just grotesque

. i really didn't like the ending and thought it was just straight up lazy. the protagonist is a creep and his colleague too, they were 40 something year old men trying to get with 20 something year old women and nobody around them thought of it as weird or told them anything. i don't recommend it. i think the author knows how to write interesting characters and the first part of the plot isn't bad, he just couldn't develop the characters or the story in a compelling way + his male characters in this story are all creeps except for shige.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexual content, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Murder, Drug abuse, and Physical abuse

mermaidsherbet's review against another edition

dark mysterious tense medium-paced

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

1.0

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Mental illness, Violence, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Torture, Body horror, Toxic relationship, and Child abuse

Minor: Abandonment, Death, Emotional abuse, Gaslighting, Pedophilia, Sexual content, Cancer, Blood, Death of parent, Injury/Injury detail, Alcoholism, Sexism, Cursing, Gore, Murder, Alcohol, Grief, Misogyny, Physical abuse, Drug abuse, and Medical content

callant's review against another edition

dark mysterious tense medium-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

2.5

I really hated Aoyama and it was hard to enjoy reading when so much was living in his perspective. Ultimately I found it a bit boring until the last 10-15 pages and then it was very intense and icky. 🙃 I knew this was coming but it definitely still hit, making me gasp, shake my head in disbelief, and feel a bit nauseous.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror

Moderate: Physical abuse

scifi_rat's review against another edition

mysterious medium-paced

• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? No

2.0

Plot: 3★
Prose: 4★
Pace: 4.5★
Concept/Execution: 5★/1.5★
Characters: 2★
Worldbuilding: 3.75★
Ending: 0.5★

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Misogyny, Murder, Physical abuse, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Body horror, Sexism, Sexual content, and Violence

Moderate: Gore, Emotional abuse, Cancer, Child abuse, Death, Drug use, Grief, and Infidelity

pranphetamine's review

dark tense medium-paced

3.75

A slow build with enjoyable writing. It felt like reading a screenplay. The ending was…a lot. It all happened so quickly and I was left feeling uncomfortable and confused. I think if

things weren’t so abrupt at the end and it unraveled a little more, or if she had more dialogue about her motive

, then this would’ve been a higher rating for me. This isn’t for everyone (I heard the film adaptation also left many feeling very disturbed), but definitely an effective horror book nonetheless.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Body horror, Domestic abuse, Gore, and Physical abuse

Moderate: Pedophilia

spooky_coochie's review

dark tense slow-paced

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

3.5

has a few great moments really dissecting how ridiculously high standards are for women and how men will completely disregard a woman's personhood in favor of their fantasy. Aoyama can only think of women as a dichotomy of good and bad, despite being told - "nice person, bad person, that's not the level this girl is at," and his eventual concession that she "was not a nice girl, but that was how he decided to think of her."

And OF COURSE the final third goes hard.

But I hate to say, Takashi Miike's film adaptation really elevates the source material. For starters, the tension building doesn't really work as well in the book - probably because we're really only in Aoyama's mind, and not getting things like flashes of Asami waiting by the phone or feeding vomit to a tongueless bag man (who is not present in the book at all).

It's fine that the violence and horror isn't as overt in the book, but it is so very unsubtle about Asami's motivations by the end. As Aoyama is being poisoned, he stops a moment and spells out Asami's entire psyche - oh, she must hate men because of her abuse and therefore wants to remove their feet just like her stepdad who molested her blah blah blah. It goes on for a page or so explaining everything in no uncertain terms. Like, thanks, I gathered that. And it's so unnatural, too - why would he have this moment pondering her entire schtick and thoroughly psychoanalyzing her when he's minutes from getting gored? Perhaps the bluntness is partially a translation issue, but even then, I think Miike draws this out much better. The film's not exactly subtle in how it connects the dots between Asami's past and her violent tendencies, but it's a bit more artful than this.

Anyways, I hate to say but I'd probably like this better had I not already seen the film adaptation. In comparison, this feels like...a half-baked treatment of the film script. Which obviously isn't the case, but...

also, and this is of course not Ryu Murakami's fault, I really cannot get over how atrociously bad this release's cover art is!!!! My other thought is that, based on how he's written women in the books by him I've read, Haruki Murakami totally would have fallen for Asami's shtick and had his feet removed lol 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Physical abuse, Torture, Violence, Emotional abuse, Domestic abuse, Animal death, and Animal cruelty

Moderate: Pedophilia, Homophobia, Sexism, Transphobia, and Misogyny

cheyanndow's review against another edition

dark mysterious tense slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

imma say it

he should have died

that’s all.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death, Animal cruelty, and Physical abuse

chloseencounter's review against another edition

mysterious tense slow-paced

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

1.5

I really wanted to enjoy this novel considering the movie adaptation is a cult classic. I have never seen the movie adaptation, though I understand there are some large changes from the book but I wanted to read it first. The concept was interesting enough but honestly 3/4 of this book was just a romance novel and even though I knew it was going to switch up I got pretty bored listening to this manipulative man talk about how in love with this young girl he was. Before the “plot twist”, if you can call it that, there was a sex scene that felt as if it was written by a teenage fan fiction author. In fact I’ve read fan fiction much less cringe worthy. The ending was lack luster, I saw it from a mile away even without having seen the movie. I still have a few books by Ryu Murakami on my TBR so I hope to enjoy those better. I’ll give the movie a try soon.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence, Alcohol, Child abuse, Kidnapping, Physical abuse, Animal death, Blood, Injury/Injury detail, Mental illness, Misogyny, Sexual content, Torture, Death, and Animal cruelty

gasolinecupcake's review

dark mysterious tense slow-paced

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

4.25

I think the movie does the storyline more justice. But the book is still a great read. 
The movie is my favorite movie of all time so maybe I'm a bit biased

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Physical abuse, Body horror, Pedophilia, Torture, Child abuse, Death, Emotional abuse, Alcohol, Blood, Murder, Sexual harassment, Toxic relationship, and Gore

Moderate: Misogyny and Sexism

-An animal dies -There is a whole chapter which is dedicated to sex that the characters have. It's pretty descriptive