Battle Royale (Le Livre de Poche, #30948)

by Koushun Takami and Masayuki Taguchi

Koushun Takami's notorious high-octane thriller is based on an irresistible premise: a class of junior high school students is taken to a deserted island where, as part of a ruthless authoritarian program, they are provided with arms and forced to kill one another until only one survivor is left standing. Criticised as violent exploitation when first published in Japan - where it then proceeded to become a runaway bestseller - BATTLE ROYALE is a LORD OF THE FLIES for the 21st century, a potent allegory of what it means to be young and (barely) alive in a dog-eat-dog world. Made into a controversial hit movie of the same name, BATTLE ROYALE is already a contemporary Japanese pulp classic.

• ISBN10: 156931778X
• ISBN13: 9781569317785
• Publish Date: 1 April 2003 (first published 1 January 1960)
• Publish Status: Active
• Publish Country: US
• Imprint: Viz Communications,U.S.
• Edition: Original ed.
• Format: Paperback
• Pages: 504
• Language: English

Reviews

[nannah]

Okay, so I've wanted to read this ever since I finished Suzanne Collins's Hunger Games. And finally, I got my hands on a copy! ... A long (Long) time after I initially wanted to read it, but that's fine.

Book content warnings:
rape
extremely detailed gore and violence (as expected)
guns & gun violence
homophobia
homophobic slurs
ableism

At this point, it's almost useless to describe what Battle Royale is about, but we have a successful fascist government sending high school kids into a death match every other year or so (last one standing wins). Why? You'll have to read to find out. Unlike The Hunger Games, Battle Royale takes you a little bit into every students' PoV, which is a little unnerving but also very satisfying in its own horrific way.

It's very very similar to The Hunger Games, but that's not really what I want to talk about here (that's a discussion for another day..., Plus that statement should really be flipped, to be honest).

This book is filled with interesting characters, but the two main characters, Shuya Nanahara and Noriko Nagakawa fall flat in comparison. They're pretty 2-dimensional and lackluster, almost there for contrast maybe. Shuya's character, in particular, gets pretty annoying, saying the same line "I trust you" over and over to the same guy, as if he's changed his mind off-scene sometime.

Anyway, plot-wise, the book kept me on the edge of my seat and never really lagged. Except for the homophobia and total shitty shock factor for when it came to rape I enjoyed it (unfortunately these are really important Exceptions ...).

I know one could argue the homophobia was in-book homophobia (aka the villain saying the American Empire is awful for its "drugs, crime, and h*mosexuals"), but then you have characters audiences are supposed to sympathize with calling gay characters "annoying q*eers", among other slurs. Besides this, the only two characters who weren't straight were part of the "bad student gangs" and were definitely the villains of the story.

Anyway, I'm still glad I finally got to read this.

[clementine]

This book is CRAZY. There's a lot more I can say about it (which I obviously will), but I think it can really be summed up with a simple "THIS IS JUST STRAIGHT UP CRAZY."

I went into this not expecting that much out of it. I knew I'd enjoy the plot, because how could I not, but I thought I'd be pretty underwhelmed by the writing style, characters, and finer details. I was actually favourably impressed in that regard. The style wasn't fantastic (though that can probably be chalked up to a questionable translation in large part), but it was better than I was expecting. What really surprised me was how well the characters were handled. There wasn't a great amount of character development, and I found some of the attempts at backstory (such as with Mitsuko) a little clumsy, but I actually was able to differentiate between many of the students, even with many of them having similar names that were a bit hard to grasp at first. Of course I couldn't tell you the first thing about some of the characters who were barely introduced before they died, or who died at the beginning, but I actually could pick out more than just Shogo, Shuya, and Noriko. Kazuo, Mitsuko, Shinji, Takaki, Kayoko, Hiroki, Yukie, Yumiko and Yukiko, Megami, etc are all fairly memorable to me.

Obviously the plot was very exciting and fast-paced. I wouldn't say it's a very complex plot, so it's not impressive in that regard, but it served the purpose of keeping me on my toes, so I'd say it was a success. I was desensitized to the deaths over the course of the book as I got used to it, though some were certainly more gruesome than others. All the deaths by shooting, while unfortunate, didn't make me feel too sick, because they were common and not that graphic, comparatively. The queasiest moment for me was when the students are shown their dead teacher, which was right at the beginning before I had time to adjust to the graphic nature of the book.

I think my biggest complaint is the ending. I was satisfied when it appeared that Shogo had killed Shuya and Noriko, because I thought that's how it should have ended. I won't say that the end was a cop-out, exactly, because Shogo still dies and Shuya and Noriko's future is certainly ambiguous, but I preferred the "first" ending more.

My other main complaint is that I wish there'd been more in the way of worldbuilding. The totalitarian republic the students are living in is very intriguing, and although I know it doesn't directly add to the plot, I would have been really interested to find out more about it. I was also intrigued by the name of the nation, the Republic of Greater East Asia, as it appeared to be an allusion to George Orwell's "Eastasia" in [b:1984|5470|1984|George Orwell|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1328718447s/5470.jpg|153313].

Overall, I really enjoyed this book, and got more out of it than I was expecting to. It had its issues, but I was pleasantly surprised by how much I enjoyed it.