Reviews with content warning for Medical trauma - Heaven

I’m conflicted about this book. It’s deceptive in how shallow it appears, especially towards the beginning; the writing style is subdued and polite almost to the point of clinicality, and the main character’s plight seems painfully simple. But it’s so much more than that. Kojima’s character arc is particularly fascinating, and so are her impacts on the narrator-- she’s presented sympathetically and ironically at once in her ideas about how best to deal with bullying. Momose is her narrative foil, the embodiment of the opposite extreme of these ideas. Heaven dives deep into the philosophy of bullying, and neither of the two main ways it’s presented are particularly appealing; Kojima is too willing to accept needless suffering, and Momose is too willing to fall into nihilism and hopelessness to care about anything, let alone other people.

I think this book’s point is to balance these ideas about pain, to emphasize the importance of understanding that some suffering is out of our control while also asserting morality wherever it can be applied and standing up against needless pain when possible. It notes its own false dichotomy with how the main character responds to the ideas he’s shown. The way it makes this point is a bit meandering at times, with lots of scenes which feel like they compound the issues in the novel far past its main theme, and often deeply disturbing to read in its detail. Yet there are genuinely beautiful moments in this book as well, and the simple but precise writing highlights them in contrast with their darker, more uncomfortable counterparts. Overall, I liked what this book had to say about the importance of balance, and I also enjoyed the uncompromisingly sublime scenes (like at the very end of the novel.) The discomfort of the rest of the book was necessary to an extent, but some of it-- especially the scenes which were not explicitly, directly connected to the furthering of the philosophical content of the novel-- was a bit much for me.

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emudds's review

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dark emotional slow-paced

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

4.25

one of my favorites i've read this year, and definitely one i liked more than breasts and eggs. sucks you in and leaves you with a sort of visceral hollow feeling.

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savvylit's review

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dark emotional sad medium-paced

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

4.5

This incredibly immersive and well-written novel is painful to read. The narrator's classmates inflict truly awful cruelties upon both him and Kojima. Kojima's friendship signifies hope for our narrator and is thus the only pleasant aspect of the entire book. By writing Heaven, Kawakami seems to remind readers that often life doesn't come with happy endings or justice. Life can be dark and unforgiving... and that's it.

This book is very well-written, hence my rating. However, I'm not sure I would ever recommend this title to anyone. Nor would I want to read it again. I had to stop reading Heaven so often; I could barely stomach the bullying and misery.

If you're ever feeling too content or glad and need a super dark book to bring you down, this might be it!

Content Warnings