Reviews with content warning for Suicide attempt - Tokio blues (Norwegian Wood)

Reviews tagging 'Suicide attempt'

Tokio blues (Norwegian Wood) by Haruki Murakami

121 reviews

lancemartija's review against another edition

Go to review page

dark emotional 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

5.0

Content Warnings

bexdot's review against another edition

Go to review page

dark emotional reflective sad 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

4.0

3.5 ⭐️

Content Warnings

thomasdj's review against another edition

Go to review page

challenging dark reflective sad 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

3.5

***Spoilers beyond the opening paragraph***

Norwegian Wood is very effective at portraying it’s main message of ‘to keep living’ showing the dangers of dwelling in the past and trying to assign meaning to those past events. Murakami is also a fabulous writer, able to paint vivid images of 60s/70s Japan with immense variety of quotable, poetic mantras. However, the plot of this novel, along with its depiction of women, leaves a lot to be desired.

The plot is perfectly mediocre, Toru (the protagonist) and Naoko (one of two primary love interests) are in love but their love for each other is limited. This is a result of Kizuki (Naoko’s boyfriend and Toru’s best friend) taking his life at 17. Understandably there is a lot of trauma associated with this, essentially forcing their love to be platonic. When it turns sexual, Naoko feels like she is betraying Kizuki and goes to stay in Hostel to recover from her grief. Instead of allowing Naoko the time and space to recover, Toru goes to visit her and writes to her weekly. This is in spite of the fact that he has met another woman. Midori, the antithesis of Naoko is lively, dramatic and opinionated but Toru continues to ignore their burgeoning love and insists on focussing on Naoko. It’s frustrating to read, even though it’s intentionalas one character says “Don’t feel sorry for yourself. Only arseholes do that.”

Content Warnings

trisreadssometimes's review against another edition

Go to review page

dark hopeful 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? Yes

3.75

Content Warnings

manel_'s review against another edition

Go to review page

medium-paced

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

4.25

Content Warnings

bunitsu's review against another edition

Go to review page

dark emotional reflective sad tense medium-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

3.75

oh lord was this a journey. i have never read a book so fast. without the time i took a break, it only took me 7 days to read. even though i had to take a break after a while due to the intensity of certain things in the book, before those things happened i couldn’t put the book down. beautifully written but as always it’s not murakami without misogyny. i hated a lot of moments in the books, some things i couldn’t comprehend why one would do some of the stuff he did. it just didn’t make sense but i will never stop reading murakami because of the beauty of his writing style.

Content Warnings