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rainbow_narwhal's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
3.5
The main characters were interesting to some extent. Noriko was unfortunately written not well. She was a damsel in distress for the most part. Quiet, shy, and submissive with a lack of identity and hardly any background story when so much was dedicated to fleshing out other characters. I was so disappointed that at
Graphic: Death, Gore, Gun violence, and Injury/Injury detail
cozyscones's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
4.5
Graphic: Death, Gore, Gun violence, Violence, Murder, Sexual harassment, and Injury/Injury detail
Moderate: Sexual assault
vandistarrr's review against another edition
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
5.0
Graphic: Death, Gun violence, Violence, Blood, and Injury/Injury detail
livia_jewel's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
5.0
Graphic: Gun violence, Physical abuse, Sexual violence, Murder, and Injury/Injury detail
Moderate: Child death, Death, and Suicide
gravityqueen's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? N/A
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
Graphic: Gun violence, Violence, and Murder
careinthelibrary's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
5.0
Did I remember all ~50 characters? No! But the reading pace kept me flying through it and the 20ish that were most important were definitely memorable. The size of the book flew by with the pacing of the short, intense chapters.
This new translation is more action-packed than the original (I compared line by line with the audiobook of the original English translation). You can tell this translator has worked on manga and video games before because the fight scenes are so much smother. But whichever version you have, read it.
What a thrilling, unexpectedly emotionally charged, bloody, anti-fascist roller coaster. This is the inspiration behind Hunger Games and battle royale style video games, but way more politically incendiary.
Graphic: Child death, Death, Gore, Gun violence, Violence, Blood, Mass/school shootings, Murder, Injury/Injury detail, and Classism
Moderate: Mental illness, Misogyny, Pedophilia, Rape, Sexism, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Suicide, Medical content, Grief, and Classism
Minor: Car accident
dakinpj's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.25
Graphic: Gore, Gun violence, and Violence
Moderate: Rape
Minor: Sexism
wiktoria_bojda's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
4.0
Graphic: Child death, Gun violence, Rape, Violence, Blood, and Murder
Moderate: Child abuse
noodlebooknook's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
5.0
Well first of all given the size of the book (650 pages of my edition) I was a little intimidated but this book FLIES by so fast it feels like a 200-300 page book.
The narration style was so unique starting with 42 characters and we get POVs with a lot of them. Which has its normal downsides where sometimes I would be less invested than normal but overall most of the POVs were so interesting.
Also I really had no idea where this book was going at all somehow have managed to avoid spoilers for 25 year and wow wow wow the ending was just amazing.
I will say absolutely trigger warning this was one of the most gore heavy and violent books I’ve read in awhile and it is absolutely an insane read along with other terrible things happening.
Overall would highly recommend this book to anyone
Graphic: Child abuse, Child death, Confinement, Death, Gore, Gun violence, Mental illness, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Violence, Medical content, Kidnapping, Mass/school shootings, Suicide attempt, Murder, Sexual harassment, War, and Injury/Injury detail
woweewhoa's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.5
The action scenes are good, and the booking is Really really good. You can tell that Koushun Takami is a wrestling fan aha.
While it's a big book, it moves Fast, the scenes just flying by and the end of chapters giving you Just enough to want to keep reading and reading to see what happens next.
My main problems with the book are the kinda over the top and vague details of the political system. I definitely believe its a fascistic system, but when it tries to make it a communist system as well, it kinda fails because the state seems to have absolutely nothing to do with communism or it's theories? And then to pit it at odds with imperialist America is odd? I know there's a deep and complicated history in japan, considering their role in WW2 and the rise of nationalism that preceded that, and then in turn you have what happened afterwards and the ways America did change ways Japan did things for the negative in the fallout after bombing Hiroshima and Nagasaki... History and the way it effects culture is complicated, and to be fair, I don't really have the knowledge of it as a whole, but I do know many Japanese creators work through these ideas and that it's something that many of them keep in mind so... IDK
There Is something interesting being done here re: that, but also I don't feel like it's really well fleshed out or anything. It works as a backdrop to the character drama and and conceit that makes the story move, but on its own it kinda fails.
But that's honestly a relatively small criticism in the face of the rest of the book, which is a really exciting book about teens being teens and how they experience and process trauma, but Also about them killing each other because a good amount of them don't trust each other and want to survive.
Graphic: Death, Gore, Gun violence, Blood, and Murder
Moderate: Ableism, Homophobia, Rape, and Vomit
Minor: Pedophilia, Sexual content, and Classism