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simzeemillerrainbow458's review
adventurous
mysterious
reflective
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0
alexa_d90's review against another edition
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
2.0
andjelast8_'s review against another edition
adventurous
challenging
mysterious
reflective
tense
fast-paced
2.25
miamia1's review
adventurous
challenging
emotional
informative
reflective
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
3.0
Interesting book. 2 short stories. Not sure I’d read from the author again
meghabytes's review
mysterious
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? N/A
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
2.0
pewterwolf's review against another edition
2.0
Review Taken From The Pewter Wolf
I'm not 100% sure how I became aware of this book. I'm not sure if I discovered it first on another blog - Portrait Of A Woman - when she was doing a joint "Japanese YA Novel Week" with another blog (called Death, Books and Tea) and then saw it on sale on Amazon's 12 Days of Kindle at the start of the year. Or, if it was the other way round: Amazon sale then saw it on Portrait of a Woman's blog.
Not sure but I bought it and, after reading the awesome Hollow Pike by James Dawson and not wanting to read another book I had high hopes on (Daylight Saving by Edward Hogan), I decided to read this as I wanted something fast, light and quite different from both Hollow Pike and Daylight Saving. Plus, if you read my New Year's Eve message, I said I wanted to be more brave and expand my reading so this seems perfect (I want to read more translations and I do have one or two in my pile so this was a nice starting point...)
Anyway, The Girl Who Leapt Through Time is, actually, two novellas in one volume: The Girl Who Leapt Through Time and The Stuff That Nightmares Are Made Of, which was originally published in Japan in 1967 (and was translated into English last year by, according to Wikipedia, David James Karashima). Both of them are written by Yasutaka Tsutsui, who is hugely popular in Japan and The Girl Who Leapt Through Time is one of his most popular works. No pressure for me as I usually stay away from classics...
But the two stories are quite different. The Girl Who Leapt Through Time is about Kazuko, who faints in her school science lab after smelling a lavender-like scent. When she wakes up, she feels different but thinks about it. Over the crash of three days, there is an earthquake, a fire at one of her friends' house and she and her friend get nearly run over. But at the exact moment of it happen, Kazuko time-leaps 24 hours in the past...
The other story, The Stuff That Nightmares Are Made Of is about Masako who has an irrational fear of Prajna masks and heights, and she decides to find out why she has these fears. At the same time, she helps her little brother, Yoshio, with his night terrors.
Now, these were fast. I started this late on Tuesday night and finished it on Thursday afternoon. And, sometimes, you want a fast read. And I liked the ideas that these two stories tackled - time travel and fear. But I felt that these issues weren't tackled property, or in a way which would have been interesting. Both these stories felt lacking as they could have been very interesting and very engaging novels in their own right. It felt like there could have been more...
Also, there were times I found the language used (either when characters spoke or prose) that I felt was quite tweed and, because of that, threw me out of the story and took a while to get back into it.
But the main problem I had with this was the lack of depth. It felt like you skimmed over the characters, their emotions and the events that could have been explored more. But, I have been told that a movie (trailer below with a fan video) tackled character developement, but with these two stories, they lacked depth and they lacked punch. Not my cup of tea, but glad I read them.
I'm not 100% sure how I became aware of this book. I'm not sure if I discovered it first on another blog - Portrait Of A Woman - when she was doing a joint "Japanese YA Novel Week" with another blog (called Death, Books and Tea) and then saw it on sale on Amazon's 12 Days of Kindle at the start of the year. Or, if it was the other way round: Amazon sale then saw it on Portrait of a Woman's blog.
Not sure but I bought it and, after reading the awesome Hollow Pike by James Dawson and not wanting to read another book I had high hopes on (Daylight Saving by Edward Hogan), I decided to read this as I wanted something fast, light and quite different from both Hollow Pike and Daylight Saving. Plus, if you read my New Year's Eve message, I said I wanted to be more brave and expand my reading so this seems perfect (I want to read more translations and I do have one or two in my pile so this was a nice starting point...)
Anyway, The Girl Who Leapt Through Time is, actually, two novellas in one volume: The Girl Who Leapt Through Time and The Stuff That Nightmares Are Made Of, which was originally published in Japan in 1967 (and was translated into English last year by, according to Wikipedia, David James Karashima). Both of them are written by Yasutaka Tsutsui, who is hugely popular in Japan and The Girl Who Leapt Through Time is one of his most popular works. No pressure for me as I usually stay away from classics...
But the two stories are quite different. The Girl Who Leapt Through Time is about Kazuko, who faints in her school science lab after smelling a lavender-like scent. When she wakes up, she feels different but thinks about it. Over the crash of three days, there is an earthquake, a fire at one of her friends' house and she and her friend get nearly run over. But at the exact moment of it happen, Kazuko time-leaps 24 hours in the past...
The other story, The Stuff That Nightmares Are Made Of is about Masako who has an irrational fear of Prajna masks and heights, and she decides to find out why she has these fears. At the same time, she helps her little brother, Yoshio, with his night terrors.
Now, these were fast. I started this late on Tuesday night and finished it on Thursday afternoon. And, sometimes, you want a fast read. And I liked the ideas that these two stories tackled - time travel and fear. But I felt that these issues weren't tackled property, or in a way which would have been interesting. Both these stories felt lacking as they could have been very interesting and very engaging novels in their own right. It felt like there could have been more...
Also, there were times I found the language used (either when characters spoke or prose) that I felt was quite tweed and, because of that, threw me out of the story and took a while to get back into it.
But the main problem I had with this was the lack of depth. It felt like you skimmed over the characters, their emotions and the events that could have been explored more. But, I have been told that a movie (trailer below with a fan video) tackled character developement, but with these two stories, they lacked depth and they lacked punch. Not my cup of tea, but glad I read them.
modernzorker's review
3.0
Since it's a collection of two novellas, each only about 90 pages long, TGWLTT is a very fast read. I've not read Tsutsui before, so I wasn't sure what to expect when I started, but while I wasn't blown away I didn't feel the stories were a waste of time and I've picked up another collection of his short stories to read at a later date.
The first story in the collection is the titular story of the girl, in this case a high school student named Kazuko, who has remained after school one day with her classmates Kazuo and Goro to help with some cleaning. Hearing someone messing around in one of the science labs, she goes to investigate and surprises an intruder in the process of concocting something. The beaker falls to the floor, she inhales the fumes, and passes out. When her friends find her, she's groggy but unharmed. All trace of the intruder and the chemicals he was mixing are gone.
But Kazuko's encounter has changed something inside her head. Either she's receiving visions of the future, one in which she watches a fire break out near Goro's house in the aftermath of an earthquake, or she's actually traveling in time (the title pretty well gives away what's actually happening). Now she's got to learn to harness this power if she can, and possibly use it to confront the intruder in the science lab from a couple of days ago to see if she can undo everything. It's a nice idea for a story, but it's all wrapped up a little too cutely and the identity of the intruder as well as what he's doing at Kazuko's school isn't very compelling. The language is nice, the translation is fine, but the story itself is pedestrian, refusing to delve too far into the inner life of its protagonist aside from a few scattered musings on what this means for her as a person.
The second story in the collection is "The Stuff Nightmares Are Made Of" and I enjoyed it much more than "The Girl Who..." It reads more like an episode of Twilight Zone, with characters trying to deal with how phobias and fears can be spontaneously generated by a simple misunderstanding of words or phrases, repressed memories, and facing one's own fears to conquer them completely. Like the first story, it's a very fast read, but there's more substance here as we get deeper into the main character's mind and slowly learn about her past. "Nightmares" is stronger than its predecessor and was what convinced me to pick up another book by Tsutsui. This is one author certainly worth pursuing further.
As a side note, "The Girl Who Leapt Through Time" has been adapted for film and TV several times over the years in Japan, including both live-action and animated features. I've not seen any versions of it, but it could appeal to people who prefer their stories told in a more visual format.
The first story in the collection is the titular story of the girl, in this case a high school student named Kazuko, who has remained after school one day with her classmates Kazuo and Goro to help with some cleaning. Hearing someone messing around in one of the science labs, she goes to investigate and surprises an intruder in the process of concocting something. The beaker falls to the floor, she inhales the fumes, and passes out. When her friends find her, she's groggy but unharmed. All trace of the intruder and the chemicals he was mixing are gone.
But Kazuko's encounter has changed something inside her head. Either she's receiving visions of the future, one in which she watches a fire break out near Goro's house in the aftermath of an earthquake, or she's actually traveling in time (the title pretty well gives away what's actually happening). Now she's got to learn to harness this power if she can, and possibly use it to confront the intruder in the science lab from a couple of days ago to see if she can undo everything. It's a nice idea for a story, but it's all wrapped up a little too cutely and the identity of the intruder as well as what he's doing at Kazuko's school isn't very compelling. The language is nice, the translation is fine, but the story itself is pedestrian, refusing to delve too far into the inner life of its protagonist aside from a few scattered musings on what this means for her as a person.
The second story in the collection is "The Stuff Nightmares Are Made Of" and I enjoyed it much more than "The Girl Who..." It reads more like an episode of Twilight Zone, with characters trying to deal with how phobias and fears can be spontaneously generated by a simple misunderstanding of words or phrases, repressed memories, and facing one's own fears to conquer them completely. Like the first story, it's a very fast read, but there's more substance here as we get deeper into the main character's mind and slowly learn about her past. "Nightmares" is stronger than its predecessor and was what convinced me to pick up another book by Tsutsui. This is one author certainly worth pursuing further.
As a side note, "The Girl Who Leapt Through Time" has been adapted for film and TV several times over the years in Japan, including both live-action and animated features. I've not seen any versions of it, but it could appeal to people who prefer their stories told in a more visual format.
livinliterary's review
lighthearted
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? N/A
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? N/A
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
2.0
2.5
freddie's review
2.0
The first story's attempt to end on an emotional note falls flat because no emotional stake is established. The story is bland. The second story reads like it's introducing trauma and repression to kids, which can be either good or bad depending on your expectation, though its title can skew your expectation a bit.