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3.77 AVERAGE
3.77 AVERAGE
A wonderful yet saddening story. It's whimsy is touched with the harrowing reality faced by the characters who live with the disappearances happening around them. I wasn't sure how this story would end, at the mid-way point I was uncertain it would be a satisfying conclusion but Ogawa managed to balance everything perfectly.
challenging
dark
emotional
mysterious
reflective
sad
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
dark
emotional
reflective
sad
tense
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
adventurous
mysterious
reflective
sad
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:
Complicated
medium-paced
dark
mysterious
reflective
sad
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
challenging
dark
emotional
sad
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
I really, really liked how this book came around in the end. Memories are strange and ephemeral, the more we try to hold on to them, maybe we cause them to change or disappear. This book is odd and can make you feel a little uncomfortable in the first half. It’s not really clear where the author is headed until maybe the last 1/3 or even 1/4 of the story, it makes you feel uneasy as the reader. Not to mention the novel within a novel aspect which also is quite unsettling, not recognizing how the two stories parallel each other until the main character’s novel is finally finished. I like a book that rewards you for taking the journey and this one certainly does. If you are curious or intrigued by the first half of the novel then I think it deserves to be finished. It is the end that will get your brain ticking away on thoughts, questions and interpretations on the novel as a whole.
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
"The bulb in the lone lamp was covered in dust, and the pale light made the scene in the cellar look like a watercolor."
You know that feeling when you suddenly remember an object- a toy, or a book, or a mundane piece of clothing from your childhood and suddenly you feel the urge to clasp it in your palms again but you can't. Or you are standing in a long summer afternoon infront of some place and you dearly wish you were at the same place but at a different time. This book feels like that.
pure raw melancholy. this book is threaded with a slow but inevitable sense of loss.
"Only occasionally did I meet another traveler- an old woman shrouded under her scarf, a single spluttering motorbike, a mangy cat."
this is such a lonely little book and the end have me feeling a little toppled.
read if you want to seep in melancholy and let yourself be submerged in it.
You know that feeling when you suddenly remember an object- a toy, or a book, or a mundane piece of clothing from your childhood and suddenly you feel the urge to clasp it in your palms again but you can't. Or you are standing in a long summer afternoon infront of some place and you dearly wish you were at the same place but at a different time. This book feels like that.
pure raw melancholy. this book is threaded with a slow but inevitable sense of loss.
"Only occasionally did I meet another traveler- an old woman shrouded under her scarf, a single spluttering motorbike, a mangy cat."
this is such a lonely little book and the end have me feeling a little toppled.
read if you want to seep in melancholy and let yourself be submerged in it.
dark
mysterious
reflective
sad
fast-paced
I was really interested in this book and the theme of memory as resistance, but so many plots and ideas were left unanswered and unresolved :(