Kirjailijakuva

Ami Sakurai

Teoksen Innocent World tekijä

11 teosta 138 jäsentä 4 arvostelua

Tietoja tekijästä

Sisältää nimet: Sakurai Ami, 桜井 亜美

Sarjat

Tekijän teokset

Merkitty avainsanalla

Yleistieto

Sukupuoli
female
Kansalaisuus
Japan

Jäseniä

Kirja-arvosteluja

I think I'm going to give up on translations, well, at least ones that stem from Japan. Here is a story of incest, rape, and prostitution, which, I suppose, is meant to shock or enthrall you, but the writing (actually, I should say translation) is so horrid that, while I'm supposed to be disgusted/empathetic/sympathetic/insert-random-emotion here, I'm just distracted by the wording.

While I normally blame the author for this, I can't help to think maybe Steven Clark shouldn't be doing translations or anything with literature, ever. Because I don't read Japanese, I'll never know the point to this book as I learned nothing, as I don't feel sorry for the main character, as I don't even know what happened.

When you're introduced to her soon-to-be rapist, you're wondering why in hell you're being introduced to him. Again, Western literature has tainted me and I probably expect things to happen in such a way, but still, I didn't see much of a purpose of the whole chapter.

I'm still puzzled trying to see why a book like this (again, perhaps just the translation) - where a emotionally closed off girl has sex with her mentally handicapped brother, becomes a prostitute while continuing to have sex with her mentally handicapped brother, discovers she's the product of artificial insemination, searches out her biological father, only to have sex with him - well, you see my point - even exists.

Perhaps it seemed like a good idea where shock media sells, but when a translation is so horrible, you have to ponder that question in what a publishing house was thinking when they said, "It seems like a good idea." Did they even read it before pushing it out there?

I should add this is the first time I completed reading the book. I'd tried in the past several times, but each time opted that shoving a pencil through my eye would have been a better deal. However, I did spend money on it, so I felt like I had to read it.

This was Snakes and Earrings all over again.


… (lisätietoja)
 
Merkitty asiattomaksi
ennuiprayer | 2 muuta kirja-arvostelua | Jan 14, 2022 |
A slim novella, bordering on shallow, Innocent World by Ami Sakurai crosses the boundary between daring writing and writing merely to shock. The main character, Ami , is a high school call girl working with friends to make money and to fill a void in her life. With a distant, even hateful family, she finds solace through an incestuous relationship with Takuya, her mentally handicapped brother.

Emotionally neglected and abused by their family, Ami and Takuya find their relief through sex, allowing Ami to connect with her true self. Dispassionate encounters with her clients have little effect on her, while her clients throughout the book look for comfort through bizarre fantasies. The characters throughout look to sex as a way to connect to their inner, truer selves revealing how distorted and damaged so many people are.

Ami eventually discovers that she is actually the product of a sperm donor whom she begins to seek out. Meanwhile she realizes she is pregnant with her half – brother’s baby. Unable to decide between abortion and having the child she continues to seek destruction while her link to her brother begins to fray. An incredibly brutal rape scene, which seems to leave little emotional trauma on Ami, punctuates the latter half of the work, as the author ups the ante in shocking the reader before the story’s climax.

Ami eventually locates her father, a person like herself who is unable to connect and relate to the outer world. As Ami looks for advice on maintaining her pregnancy, they are able to free each other from the fears that have tethered them. As the story closes Ami has found peace of a sort albeit through a passage of incredibly destructive behaviors. Although she largely continues her work, has dropped out of school, and run away, her ability to reach and connect to friends has grown, and with such a disturbing novel, it has to suffice as a silver lining.

Perhaps it’s a result of the translation but the writing feels juvenile in general (overwrought similes) while the story’s events serve merely to shock without exploring any further than superficial emotions. Disaffected Japanese youth received better treatment through Hitomi Kanehara’s Snakes and Earrings, which while flawed escapes the poor writing of Innocent World. While nihilism predominates, there is a spark of hope at the end, however this light does not compensate for an incredibly unsatisfactory reading experience.
… (lisätietoja)
1 ääni
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brianjungwi | 2 muuta kirja-arvostelua | Apr 26, 2013 |
I don't really know why I read this book. I guess I bought it cause it kept coming up in that 'readers who bought this also bought' thing when I was looking for Kanehara novels. In a way I almost wish I hadn't read this book. In a way it was terrible, because the content of the book was so hard to swallow. I don't even know what I think about this, this book has left me very uncertian. I can't even describe it. I mean I guess its good that Ami found a reason for her life but everything that she did to get there and the life that she left behind was so disturbing that I don't even know how to feel about it. This book is weird.… (lisätietoja)
½
 
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na-chan | 2 muuta kirja-arvostelua | Apr 17, 2009 |
This review was originally written for the website ListerX.com, which is now defunct. It can also be found on my blog, The Graphic Librarian.

Cover
When I first picked up this manga out of my review stack my first reaction was, "Oooh, pretty!" The fantastic color combinations and wonderfully curly font seemed perfectly suited to what appeared to be a typical shojo manga. (Boy, was I in for a surprise!) Anyway, the characters poses are excellent and the decision to use an all white background was definitely a good one. Anything else would have been at war with the wonderful retro color scheme. The only thing I don't like is how the white fades to pale green down at the bottom. It looks more like a mistake in the printing process rather than a conscious design choice. Something else I liked that I didn't notice right away was that the back features the same image as the front - only flip-flopped, so that Juri is looking out at you instead of Kazemichi.

Artwork
To be honest, I didn't really care that much for the illustrations in this manga. The characters themselves were nicely drawn and very pretty to look at, but that's about it. The rest of the work seemed sloppy and somehow unfinished. Instead of something that looked complete, a lot of the work just meandered off into nothing. Granted, the story is extremely character driven, however I can't see that as good justification for not giving the backgrounds and details a "finished" feel to them. The characters are the only place where it looks like the artist put forth any kind of effort at all. Of course, by now you should know from most of my previous reviews, how detail-oriented I am when it comes to artwork. So I suggest you thumb through this one a bit to decide if you like the style before shelling out any hard-earned cash.

Plot
**Possible Spoilers Warning**

The story begins when a boy named Reiji suffers a terrible accident which seriously damages about 90% of his body. However, a mysterious medical group intervenes, saving his life by building Reiji a new body - even his face has to be altered. Reiji, feeling like his old self is dead, takes Kazemichi as his new name and very quickly begins to develop an apathetic view on life. From there the story catapults its way through Kazemichi's school career and doesn't slow down until he meets Juri Mitani, a young woman who seems vaguely familiar somehow. Despite their idiosyncrasies, the two quickly hit it off and it's not long before they decide to move in together. During this time Kazemichi seems to spend all of his time doing one of two things - sleeping with Juri or contemplating his old life. Most of the manga is told via Kazemichi's internal dialogue, which suits the story perfectly because it gives the reader the same feelings of solitude and detachment that Kazemichi constantly experiences.

Despite his detachment from the world, Kazemichi finds himself falling deeply in love with Juri and it scares him because he knows his synthetic body isn't going to last much longer. Fearing for what will happen to the people he cares about once he's gone, Kazemichi begins to make plans to ensure their protection after his death. However, along the way he uncovers some very disturbing truths his mother, her married lover and their connection to the secretive medical group which originally saved his life - truths which will change Kazemichi forever.

Content Warnings
Language = There might be a word here or there, but it's mostly clean in this respect.

Violence = Not really - just the accident at the very beginning and a fire later in the story which kills a few "extras".

Nudity = Yes, but it's relatively tasteful - No full frontals or anything like that.

Sexual Situations = The two main characters are sexually active and it's obvious what they're doing. However, the scenes are subtle - not at all what I would call "graphic". There are also undertones of homosexuality and "favors for services rendered".

Ratings
Cover - 7/10 - Simple yet colorful with only a few small flaws.

Artwork - 6/10 - Beautiful characters, but everything else feels half-hearted and unfinished.

Plot - 7/10 - What seems simple at first slowly turns into a complex and fascinating maze of plots and sub-plots. It's officially a sci-fi, but the story still feels very real.

Overall - 7/10 - I wasn't expecting to enjoy this story, but it was surprisingly good - if only the artwork was a little better.
… (lisätietoja)
 
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purpledragon42 | Jan 26, 2007 |

Tilastot

Teokset
11
Jäseniä
138
Suosituimmuussija
#148,171
Arvio (tähdet)
½ 2.7
Kirja-arvosteluja
4
ISBN:t
15
Kielet
3

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