Reviews with content warning for Mental illness - Heaven

Reviews tagging 'Mental illness'

Heaven by Mieko Kawakami

68 reviews

xlaraxk's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional inspiring sad tense slow-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

3.25

Not my favourite book by Kawakami but she's still a brilliant writer on bad days. Some scenes in this book are incredibly hard to read; the bullying portrayed in this is so cruel and brutal that it made me a bit nauseous at times. Some parts felt a bit too slow even though its a rather short book. There is not that much happening, so if you're not that interested in reading character-focused stories, I'd skip this one. But Kawakami is truly a master at showing us complex human relationships through wonderful poetic language. Unsettling, sad, and simultaneously inspiring and hopeful.

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saphfics's review against another edition

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dark emotional sad tense slow-paced

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

3.5

Is this a good book?: yes
Is it well written?: yes
Will I ever reread this: absolutely not

Read this when you are in a pretty okay to pretty good state because ot is really one of the heaviest books I have ever read

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rin_dawg's review

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dark emotional sad

5.0

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12dejamoo's review against another edition

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challenging dark medium-paced

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

1.5

This was sort of horrible to read. I mean, I think it was horrible on purpose but nonetheless. There were also long sections where I had no clue what was actually going on or what people were saying

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_inge's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional sad tense

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes

3.0

I knew this would be a tough read. I usually avoid books which feature bullying as it is, and I was warned of particularly vivid descriptions of bullying in this novel. I didn’t think it would be this vivid and this disturbing, however. I skimmed some passages because they were too much to handle. There’s a lot of trigger warnings for anything relating to bullying in this.

I didn’t feel a connection to any of the main characters, as them being bullied was the center of this novel. Aside from Kojima’s interest in art and both of them enjoying reading fiction, we don’t actually see them do anything beyond being bullied or discussing what bullying has done to them. I don’t even think the protagonist is named, as everyone simply calls him ‘Eyes’ when he’s bullied. Bullying therefore takes over their entire personalities.

This does mean there’s space for some really interesting conversations about what it means to be bullied or to bully. Some ideas on this really helped me shape my own feelings about having been bullied in the past.

I love that we got a conversation between one of the bullies and the protagonist as well. I’m not sure if I agree with the ‘happy’ ending; I wonder if the protagonist genuinely felt disturbed by his eye too and wanted it fixed because of that, or if his sole reasoning for wanting it fixed was being bullied for it.

I wish we’d learn more about Kojima too. Since the protagonist doesn’t see her again I hope she didn’t harm herself in any way. The ‘happy’ ending for him therefore didn’t feel as happy as a whole, as Kojima might be struggling.

All in all this was a difficult read. It’s definitely not for everyone, and I’m unsure what to think of this myself. It’ll be interesting to see if I think back on this in the future.

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