Reviews with content warning for Hate crime - Heaven

Reviews tagging 'Hate crime'

Heaven by Mieko Kawakami

8 reviews

jovanas_cloud's review against another edition

dark emotional reflective sad tense medium-paced

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

3.0

It was underwhelming and anticlimactic.

I feel Kojima is the biggest contributor to the things I didn't like in the book. Her philosophy of Heaven, her philosophy on why they're being bullied, her reasons for being dirty, etc. To explain further, I don't understand what she wanted to say with renaming the painting because the actual name felt underwhelming. Her philosophy that they're being bullied because they're allowing it, is true to some extent because they never tried to fight back (which was easier for her to fix). The reason for being dirty, would be a great topic if she got some kind of help.

I understand she misses her dad but not performing basic hygiene like showering, washing clothes or just not being dirty in general because she's trying to be closer to her dad who is dirt poor and away working hard, IS A HUGE PROBLEM. It is such a serious problem that she even starts starving herself by the end of the book. I just refuse to believe that her mom didn't intervene in all like she must've smelled her at one point.

Another nonsensical thing I would like to bring up is the nihilistic conversation between the MC and Momose. First of all, not only is so dumb but the big words and theories these 14 year olds are using just seems very unlikely to happen. Like yeah it makes sense that a bully doesn't see why it's wrong to bully others but to have such big philosophy and so many points??

The culmination - I was just waiting for something big and dramatic to happen, it was always so close until it happened and the consequences were anticlimactic.

All that happened at the Whale park with Ninomiya bullying them to strip and have sex, and after that Kojima never interacts with the MC again because he wants to get surgery for his eye?? Again she is clinging to the past and to what's comforting to her even if it makes her and other's miserable. She's disappointed because he's doing something to have an easier and more comfortable life when she could do the same more easily and cheaply too.

The last chapter was really underwhelming. I was hoping to get some more results with what happened at school, with Kojima, Ninomiya, and Momose, but got nothing of that sort. Just MC moving forward with his new sight.

I love bullying and trauma bonding works Kawakami somehow managed to get nothing done. The friendship felt rather shallow most of the time, except the gym scene

where they were wiping MC's blood after he got kicked so hard in the head multiple times because he was a ball.

If only Kawakami went deeper and harder, this would've been much better.

Content Warnings

tangerinejellies's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional sad medium-paced

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

4.0

Not completely sure how to feel about this book, it was a very heavy read and some of the characters’ outlooks on the world were quite unsettling, though not impossible to understand. They’re kids who still have a lot of maturing to do, and don’t necessarily understand the world around them that well yet, so I can see how they’d think like that, which all the more adds to the sort of pain I felt reading this, witnessing the hardship of navigating the dark parts of the world and trauma and violence and things like that at such a young age. Rough.

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lovelylilelle's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional hopeful sad medium-paced

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

4.0

Content Warnings

xlaraxk's review against another edition

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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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tindin's review against another edition

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emotional reflective sad fast-paced

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? Yes

3.75

Content Warnings

epicredza's review against another edition

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dark emotional sad tense medium-paced

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

4.0

Content Warnings

betul's review against another edition

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dark medium-paced

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

2.0

Content Warnings

mmatti300's review against another edition

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reflective sad fast-paced

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

4.5

After reading The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle this was a bit of a breath of fresh air, despite being yet another Japanese translated fiction and having certain problems that are apparent in Murakami's works as well. Heaven is a coming-of-age romp that allows the reader to truly feel the main character's pain, hold-ups, and the terrors of adolescence. I found this a great little book to read in a day, beyond thrilled to have found this at the library and I'm excited to read more of Kawakami's work in the future. One thing that makes me wish I could read Japanese is the way that Kawakami along with translator Sam Bett and David Boyd use wordplay to drive the novel and bring the characters together. Because I am limited by my inability to read and comprehend any language outside of English, I am limited to the English wordplay. This makes me wonder if the delightful wordplay I found in this novel changes the storyline in the original Japanese. Overall, very enjoyable.

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