A review by jinglebellyee
Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and His Years of Pilgrimage by Haruki Murakami

adventurous challenging emotional mysterious tense 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? Yes

2.0

Still thinking between 2 or 3 stars… I really want to love it because of the friendship struggles that the book explores (which personally hits very close to home) but oh man.. I absolutely can’t unds the part where Tsukuru was “accused” of “r@ping” his friend Shiro like what do you mean – you either did it or you didn’t!! It’s so violent and horrifying but yet the book didn’t conclude the part well (or so I thought) and it merely just ended with Shiro being mentally ill.. and brutally murdered?! And the murderer is on the loose! 

It’s also very strange (and honestly disturbing) that Tsukuru has sexual dreams about his platonic female friends, and continues to talk about Kuro’s breasts and feminine touch when he met up with her WHILE he had Sara as his girlfriend. I wished they focused just on the friendship and the coming-of-age, adulting and self-identity struggles they each had, without going into unnecessary details about Tsukuru’s inner sexual desires that really didn’t add much to the story. Like isolation and loneliness, and having all your friends walk away and ignore you out of the sudden.. HURTS and they are so real! Which the author could have focused on, and explored more when they finally reunited. And the abstract meanings and life lessons that people like Sara, Haida bring to Tsukuru’s life.. so many more meaningful things to talk about. 

I’m going to walk away from this story just remembering that Tsukuru is a h@rny guy that wants to screw all his female friends. Okay yknw what, 2 stars it shall be then

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