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A review by ladybugwrites
Terminal Boredom by Izumi Suzuki
challenging
dark
reflective
tense
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? N/A
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
3.0
When I picked up this book and read the cover (and the first page), I was intrigued. Not only does it sound like it's right up my alley, it's a different perspective on huge topics that I have a strong connection to or interest in.
Unfortunately, I didn't get what I was hoping for. Overall, Suzuki is a great writer and I enjoy the storytelling, the characters are fine (mainly whats expected for some that appear for a short time in short stories) and all the stories have engaging plots that I want to know the end of. But, despite all these great points made throughtout a story, despite all the comments on society and the speculations on what may happen in the future, none of the stories have a point. Now a story doesn't need one, but these stories all feel like they are supposed to have one. Maybe I'm just too stupid to understand the points, which it certainly feels like when I don't get something I think I should, but it's disappoint to be expecting a punchline, something in those last few pages to make me really get what she was trying to show, but it never happened. I was hoping it wouldn't be all the stories, but even when I closed the book on the last one, I still hadn't gotten that feeling. There was as if something was missing.
I do want to add, though, that doesn't feel like stories about women and society and all of that, as the cover wants to say, but rather, these are all stories about depression. There is a layer underneath the societal commentary that is mental health, and specifically depression. The numbness of living in society, and it comes across in all seven stories. Looking at them through this lens, does make them something else, and even possibly a little better. And knowing Suzuki took her own life, definitely puts to show that there are more to these stories than first meets the eye.
I think this is a book I'll pick up again, sometime in the future. Maybe I'll feel differently about them, or maybe reading them again will open up those parts I didn't fully grasp. I don't know. But I do know I finished this book with a lot of thoughts because even if the stories lack something, there's a lot of small comments throughout each of them that all make you think and reflect, and that in itself is a feat.
Unfortunately, I didn't get what I was hoping for. Overall, Suzuki is a great writer and I enjoy the storytelling, the characters are fine (mainly whats expected for some that appear for a short time in short stories) and all the stories have engaging plots that I want to know the end of. But, despite all these great points made throughtout a story, despite all the comments on society and the speculations on what may happen in the future, none of the stories have a point. Now a story doesn't need one, but these stories all feel like they are supposed to have one. Maybe I'm just too stupid to understand the points, which it certainly feels like when I don't get something I think I should, but it's disappoint to be expecting a punchline, something in those last few pages to make me really get what she was trying to show, but it never happened. I was hoping it wouldn't be all the stories, but even when I closed the book on the last one, I still hadn't gotten that feeling. There was as if something was missing.
I do want to add, though, that doesn't feel like stories about women and society and all of that, as the cover wants to say, but rather, these are all stories about depression. There is a layer underneath the societal commentary that is mental health, and specifically depression. The numbness of living in society, and it comes across in all seven stories. Looking at them through this lens, does make them something else, and even possibly a little better. And knowing Suzuki took her own life, definitely puts to show that there are more to these stories than first meets the eye.
I think this is a book I'll pick up again, sometime in the future. Maybe I'll feel differently about them, or maybe reading them again will open up those parts I didn't fully grasp. I don't know. But I do know I finished this book with a lot of thoughts because even if the stories lack something, there's a lot of small comments throughout each of them that all make you think and reflect, and that in itself is a feat.