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(4.34/5)Good for learning only
- good for recognizing n2 grammar
- relatively complex sentences and vocabulary
- the story was a drag and an uninspiring taken human nature , making it painful to follow
Dark Roshamon Style Thriller
CW: child death, animal abuse
I read this in Japanese along with the audiobook and oooooof, what a ride.
Each chapter had me gripped. Glued to the pages to find out what happens next.
The story was simple but we'll executed. I liked how each chapter was told from a different perspective so you could really understand what was going through each person's mind.
The Japanese narrator was great, matching her voice to each dcharacter so they were distinct.
The Japanese is around upper N2/N1. The text is very dense at times, but if you've read a lot of murder mysteries then this will be an easy read.
It is the last homeroom lesson of the school year and homeroom teacher Moriguchi Yuko still has a few things she wants to tell her students of class B, 1st year of middle school. Firstly, that the death of her 4-year-old daughter was not an accident. Secondly, that i was pupils of this very class that killed her.
These statements lead to a series of "confessions" (告白) made by different characters, but all involved in this very case. Gradually, more and more layers emerge and the perspectives add details that eventually make up the mystery.
The language thus differs from chapter to chapter, which is a challenge from time to time, but this also means that vocabulary in particular is also repeated in each confession, which had a very positive effect on my reading flow. There was one chapter which, in my opinion, hardly contributed any details and repeated too much of the previous confession. Moreover, this chapter was not really a confession either. Apart from that, I really enjoyed reading this revenge thriller and thought it was the perfect choice as my introduction to the Japanese mystery genre.
Surpassed my expectations
It was an easier read than I expected. I'm not sure if the first chapter is truly difficult or just intimidating as it is a stream of consciousness with few paragraph breaks. As others have noted, after the first chapter, it gets easier. During the second chapter in particular, I felt like I was flying through the pages.
Captivating from start to finish.
Exciting Thriller From Start to End
Simple plot summary: A four-year-old kid was found dead in a school where her mother, Yuko Moriguchi, teaches. Apparently, the cause of death is not by accident, it was two of Yuko's students that killed her.
It's my favorite Japanese book so far. Simple premise but every character is written excellently, which is very important in this kind of story.
The first chapter is the hardest part of this book, the writing style is quite unique for a first-person perspective so it's probably going to throw you off balance. Fortunately from the second chapter onwards the writing style becomes "normal" and straightforward. The vocab is mostly daily stuff so it's not that hard to follow as long as you got an N2 base.
Not as hard as the beginning suggests
I started this as my 10th book in japanese. After about 5% of the book, i wanted to drop it, because it felt way to hard for me. It has a unique writing style in that it talks to the reader sometimes(which are other people in the story reading letters etc.) and that threw me off quite a bit. But i heard that it would become more normal after the first chapter, and it did.
I'm glad i pushed through, it was an amazing read! Also from a learning perspective it had quite a few grammar points that i had not experienced before and they were repeated quite a few times. So it was really good for learning too. I feel like i got nice little boost in my japanese comprehension after finishing this book.
There's not much substantial information to add which other reviews haven't covered, so I'll be brief:
Content warnings: Child death, references to suicide, murder, animal abuse
Difficulty: The first chapter is by far the most complex and it dips into a fast paced read after that
Personal enjoyment: I love books about complicated, largely unlikeable people and stories with twisted circumstances and relationships. This book 100% scratched that itch. I enjoyed each chapter as layers were peeled back to get you closer and closer to the truth, if the truth can even really be known. I found the messiness of the intersecting viewpoints and potentially-unreliable-narrator story telling to be very satisfying.
As language learning, the opening difficulty everyone else mentions is real. I found the late sections (~80% on?) to spike as well at times, with rather lengthy sentences on somewhat abstract musing and a lot of abrupt, easy to miss subject changes. The vocab is fairly straightforward, though, and it's not overly descriptive since it's all told in monologues and the like.
The content itself is good, though I grew a bit weary by the end. It's a pretty well-considered thriller with a lot of interlocking pieces and gradual reveals for recontextualization, but at a certain point I couldn't help finding it slightly repetitive. I don't think it quite sticks the landing on totally avoiding feelings of going through the motions of retreading, though I always like to add the disclaimer that I read Japanese very slowly still, and were that not the case, may have flown through parts that were dragging at a much more reasonable pace.
Not a fan of the book, but good for N2 learners
告白 was the second Japanese book I managed to read.
On the positive side, it was useful for seeing how N2 grammar is actually used in context, but that was about it.
I’m not a fan of horror, so I don’t want to give a biased opinion of the book. It was difficult (at least for me) to follow the story, so I wasn’t able to fully understand it.
That said, if you’re at the N2 level and want to see how grammar is used in real situations, this book is a very good example.