Reviews tagging 'Abandonment'

Kafka en la orilla by Haruki Murakami

79 reviews

epshcherbinina's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional mysterious reflective tense fast-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? Yes

3.5

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Content Warnings

Minor: Murder, Pedophilia, Abandonment, Incest, Mental illness, Violence, Rape, Injury/Injury detail, Death, Sexual assault, Adult/minor relationship, Torture, and Sexual content

marsmartis's review against another edition

dark mysterious slow-paced

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

2.75

The sex scenes become more justified the more the book advances, but it still feels like not good enough of a reason for them to be there, let alone so detailed, let alone incest and rape.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Adult/minor relationship, Gore, Incest, Rape, Sexual assault, Death of parent, Injury/Injury detail, Self harm, War, Abandonment, Cannibalism, and Blood

corpsepose's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional mysterious reflective

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

Ambiwalentna w odbiorze. Lekka, ale nie prosta. Po przeczytaniu mam do niej stosunek "środkowy", ale w żadnym razie nie neutralny, może nawet nieco bardziej na minus. Na pewno do ponownego odwiedzenia, być może więcej niż raz.

Mitologizacja nie zatrzymuje się na przepowiedni, być może stąd trudna w ocenie przez pryzmat zwykłego, "dzisiejszego" zestawu norm i wartości. 

Historia, zdaje mi się, o pudełkach, drzwiach i ramkach, a także o połowach rzeczy, co zgrabnie podsumowują cytat przytoczony na okładce i wspomnienie o "Uczcie" Platona.

Z prostszych obserwacji: Murakami nie umie pisać kobiet, za to ciekawa transreprezentacja. Różnice kulturowe mogą dawać się we znaki czytelnikowi.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Gore, Sexism, Toxic relationship, Animal death, Death of parent, Dysphoria, Sexual content, Child abuse, Death, Physical abuse, Rape, Suicide, Abandonment, Animal cruelty, Body horror, Incest, Injury/Injury detail, Sexual violence, Sexual assault, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide attempt, Murder, Sexual harassment, Torture, Emotional abuse, Pedophilia, and Violence

thenoboshow's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional mysterious reflective sad slow-paced

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

3.5

Prose felt like stumbling through a dream. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death, Body horror, Murder, Sexual assault, Rape, Torture, Abandonment, Adult/minor relationship, Death, Grief, Incest, Suicide, and Animal cruelty

Moderate: Child abuse

risemini's review against another edition

dark emotional funny mysterious reflective sad fast-paced

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

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: War, Rape, Sexual content, Death, Abandonment, Adult/minor relationship, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Blood, Self harm, Violence, and Incest

10000hats's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional funny mysterious reflective sad fast-paced

• 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

4.5

My first Murakami, so I don't really have anything to compare to but it was definitely hard to put down. It's one of those reread some lines over and over again books in order to really get what was going like. Very dreamcore, nonsensical/pos, and kinda absurd. Could almost say Kafkaesque but I wouldn't go that far. Left me in a bit of turmoil and frustration honestly, though I was very sad for some of the secondary characters. INTERESTING THOUGH, WOULD RECCOMEND.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Pedophilia, Adult/minor relationship, Violence, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Incest, Rape, and Sexual assault

Moderate: Abandonment and War

Minor: Child abuse

iris_lrf's review against another edition

dark mysterious reflective fast-paced

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

3.0

This is one of the worst best books you will ever read. Murakami will sprout some of the most deep, poetic words imaginable, but it will be right after the fifteen-year-old protagonist

fucks the ghost of his still-alive maybe-mother

. It is a perfect example of the magic realism genre, and by that I mean it makes absolutely zero sense.

The ending, too, is ridiculously vague. I suppose I should be glad there's a chance she wasn't his mother, but potentially incestuous vampirism sure is something I hadn't considered before. Also, what the fuck was that worm thing about?

 

I haven't read anything else by Murakami (and I don't intend to), but according to others, a gripping style, adamant homo/transphobia, and obsessive Freudianism are all staples of his works. And this book is no different: a modern (at the time) retelling of Oedipus Rex where the protagonist is newly fifteen, fully aware of the prophecy, and - I cannot stress this enough - actively choosing to pursue it. It's technically not pedophilia because Japanese laws are different than in the west, but still. Come on. What the hell. Oh, and his sister's in the prophecy too. I'll let you guess which part. You think this review is running a little long? You haven't even SEEN the number of content warnings I'm going to slap on this bad boy.
All that said, even with one protagonist whose only character traits are "Oedipus complex" and "teenage boy," another who is just a walking autism stereotype (I mean, a child in a man's body? Come on), and a whole cast of chronically horny sociopaths, it SOMEHOW manages to be a page-turner. Truly one of the few books that you wish with all your heart you could put down, but are forced by some external power to continue reading until your sanity finally breaks. Because trust me, it will break. For me it happened around chapter five. 
So yeah, if multitudes of

needlessly graphic incest, VERY borderline pedophilia, pointless vagueness, childhood trauma, a trans man literally calling himself a woman of his own accord, gore, violence towards animals, AND MORE

are all things you can stand, sure. Go ahead. But don't say I didn't warn you. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Abandonment, Adult/minor relationship, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Blood, Death, Child abuse, Death of parent, Gore, Incest, Mental illness, Transphobia, Murder, Violence, Pedophilia, Rape, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , and Sexual content

Moderate: Animal death, Death of parent, Incest, Misogyny, Outing, Pedophilia, Violence, Panic attacks/disorders, Animal cruelty, Domestic abuse, Abandonment, Adult/minor relationship, Child abuse, Alcohol, Murder, Blood, Death, Emotional abuse, Gore, Mental illness, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , and Transphobia

Minor: Cursing

espea's review against another edition

challenging emotional reflective 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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexual content, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Sexual assault, Gore, and Death

Minor: Abandonment, Adult/minor relationship, and War

moonknitter's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional mysterious reflective tense medium-paced

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

4.0

In terms of the plot it was definitely a very interesting book and I loved the magical realism elements and many aspects of how the book was written but I hated he main character. The chapters traded off between essentially the story of Nakata (and later Hoshimo) and the story of Kafka, Oshima and Miss Saeki. I wish the whole book was just the story of Nakata and Hoshimo. These characters were the most loveable, I found myself laughing out loud at things Hoshimo said. On the other hand, Kafka is just a teenage boy. I got very tired of hearing about his cock in this story. I get it, he is a teenage boy and this is a major theme. But all of the Oedipus stuff was pretty weird and I didn’t find him likeable as a chapter. He took himself too seriously and so did Oshima. It also would have been nice to have more female characters who were not just there to be sexual objects for the teenage boy/fulfill his weird mom issues. The gender identity of Oshima was an interesting topic but I felt like the way it was discussed between the two still felt contrived or something. Overall I did like this book but literally could have done without half of it I would hav been happy to just read about Nakata and Hoshimo and what they get up to together. This book also was very easy to imagine as a movie and I could see all of the characters as different actors. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Adult/minor relationship, Incest, Animal death, Sexual content, Murder, and Animal cruelty

Moderate: Death and Abandonment

Minor: Rape

madamenovelist's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional reflective sad tense medium-paced

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

3.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence, Abandonment, Body horror, Cursing, Death of parent, Injury/Injury detail, Murder, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Blood, Sexual violence, Rape, Death, Adult/minor relationship, Alcohol, Grief, Gore, and Incest

To elaborate on content warnings: Two different instances of incest, both involving an adult & a minor. One was consensual in the real world and another was rape in a shared dream. The animal cruelty is extremely gruesome and involves cats, so cat lovers should brace or skip this book altogether.