Reviews with content warning for Suicide - N.P.

This book has some... wild perspective on incestual relationships. I get that the message is kind of "we're all broken and flawed, not just the ones who sleep with both their father and their half brother," but I think more could have been done to paint incest as what it is, especially when it came to the father. Sui was abused from a young age, so maybe that should be a more talked about subject in the book.
Kazami didn't really do much for me as a narrator. She felt sort of floating through without doing much other than being swept down the river.

Some quotes:
"There's no better way to get to know a person than having a meal together."
"I can't imagine life without a story."
"After a period of being unable to speak those words, something changed in my head. I came to see the array of colors that lay behind words. When my sister was being nice to me, I perceived a brilliant image of pink light. My mother's words and gestures when she was teaching us English were gold... Living like that utterly convinced me of the extreme limitations of language. I was just a child then, so I had only an intuitive understanding of the degree to which one loses control of words once they are spoken or written. It was then that I first felt a deep curiosity about language, and understood it as a tool that encompasses both a single moment and eternity."

Content Warnings

enjaromirjagr's review against another edition

Go to review page

dark emotional reflective sad medium-paced

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

4.75

Content Warnings

dvnngyn's review against another edition

Go to review page

dark mysterious relaxing slow-paced

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

3.0

It’s a long read to me despite the length of this book. Didn’t meet my expectations, intriguing plot but the writing gets draggy at times.

Content Warnings

youkirmv's review against another edition

Go to review page

challenging dark sad tense fast-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

3.75

Content Warnings

aeski's review against another edition

Go to review page

emotional mysterious reflective fast-paced

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

4.0

I enjoyed being in the world but it wasn’t my favorite of Banana’s books. I thought the incest theme was strange and the teen-adult romantic relationship was very normalized. As always with Banana’s books, it was a quick and easy read with powerful messages.

Content Warnings

sleepyriv's review against another edition

Go to review page

mysterious reflective 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? It's complicated

3.25

Content Warnings

james1star's review against another edition

Go to review page

challenging dark funny mysterious reflective tense medium-paced

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

3.0

TW: this book and review contains mentions of suicide and incest

I don’t know what to say about this book. It’s well written with characters and a ‘plot’ that makes you carry on reading, it’s engaging to start but then… I dunno? ‘n.p.’ follows the story of Kazami as she’s recounting around 6 months of a year whilst also thinking back to things (sort of). The central storyline consists of a book by the Japanese author Sarao Takase who shortly after completing the 89th story died by suicide and then the three people who have tried to translate the final story into Japanese (as it was written in English) then decide to die by suicide too. Kazami is roped into this world by the book’s latest victim Shoji who was her boyfriend. In the present day she’s reintroduced to Takase’s twin children Otohiko and Saki, then later to someone else involved with the family called Sui but revealing her connection is kinda a spoiler. Other things happen and it’s decent-ish, I liked seeing the MC becoming friends (kinda) with them but also a large chunk of this book was a little frustrating sort of.

The book does have some positives with Yoshimoto’s writing being somewhat like a dream - it’s very strange to describe but it’s very intriguing. Parts of ‘n.p.’ are also very funny in a not witty or humorous way but just so bonkers I guess that I did quite like. The premise is also very fascinating and as soon as I got this I wanted to give it a read but held off to the beginning of July. But around halfway through I felt a little let down and it’s not that I had very high expectations but more I didn’t know where it was going or more importantly why. The discussion of incest and the ways certain characters try to minimise or romanticise it was very uncomfortable, and the more things fitted into place and the book developed I did want to remove myself in some essence… does that make sense? Like a few books I’ve read recently where suicide is a primary focus/motif, I wasn’t very pleased with the discourse on this matter. The character’s attitudes seemed rather blasé and it frustrated me when an inappropriate/unconcerned level of attention was given to the topic - I get suicide is viewed differently in East Asia then the ‘West’ but I don’t know, it’s a strange one to ponder. As I went on reading I was still enjoying the act of reading it but not necessarily the story or engaging with the characters. That being said, the ending was very good and I liked the ambiguity to it.

I do and don’t recommend this book. That that as you will.

Content Warnings

More...