What happens to people when they die? --They’re gone. - What happens when they’re gone? --They disappear, and that’s it. Three years after that conversation, Housuke’s mother died of illness. A few days after he and his father began living alone, his childhood friend Aki’s mother commits suicide. Then Aki is involved in a car accident, and even Yoichiro is … What is the shocking truth that a boy in the fifth grade of elementary school, who hopes for a small happiness with his father, arrives at ...
If there are sensitive topics for you, definitely peek the spoiler tags on this one, but do bear in mind they are spoilers.
Language difficulty wise I suspect people listening to this got a different experience than people reading the book. The author seems fond of using kanji for words that don't typically get written in kanji much these days (お早う, 何故 off the top of my head). But in general the vocab stretch wasn't too crazy aside from some less common idioms I spotted in a few places and quoting of an old story.
Generally it was not particularly flowery language and a good deal of dialogue and repetition.
As for my feelings on the book - I liked it, but more for the characters than the plot. If I'm being honest the plot felt a bit weak and convoluted, but the characters felt fleshed out and the writing was great at holding tension. Even though I felt a bit 'huh? that's it?' at the end, I have to say I enjoyed a good 85% of this book pretty damn well, and keeping to the book club schedule was hard at times.
I suspect if you like 恩田陸 books (which are also about character relationships and mystery, but tend to have weak endings) you'll similarly enjoy this book.