Battle Royale

Much more violent and confronting than the American remake, "the Hunger Games", but also with a lot more heart and intelligence.

Definitely not for everyone, there's excessive violence and references to sexual violence, all of the violence involving minors, but if you can handle it, it's rewarding.

The narrator does a solid job, stumbling over the pronunciation of several words, but keeping the feeling and pacing moving.

Greatest book ever! I really really loved it so much

This book is about how a class of junior high students is taken to a deserted island and forced to kill each other until one person is left alive and proclaimed the winner, a program made by the authoritarian regime of Republic of Greater East Asia.I loved the movie and didn't even know it was based on a novel until about a week ago so of course I had to pick it up as soon as possible. This book is by far the most action oriented novel I've ever read. You are thrust into the action almost immediately and it doesn't really stop until you close the book.I found it pretty amazing how the author can take a book with 40+ characters and it never really feels rushed or like it is taking away from the storyline of the main characters. Obviously there are some characters that we don't get much from and there are only 10 or so that have there own story lines that go beyond just the section about their deaths, but I really felt that Takami did a great job in giving us just enough to not feel cheated by any of the "fringe" characters stories.Be warned this is a pretty gory book, and most of what you will read will be about how certain people are dying. The author doesn't skimp on describing the action, but don't think he doesn't dive into the emotions of these kids...it's a tight rope to walk and he does it beautifully.

Boring. Just boring. Did not find it disturbing or difficult to read, just a boring book.

**mild spoilers ** An enjoyable and bloody satire, doing for Japan what Orwell and Stephen King did for the UK and US.Takami makes the most of his large supporting cast to offer a multitude of different responses to his premise, and there’s more than enough action, intrigue and incident to justify the page count.I’d love to give it five stars but a few issues hold it back. The fascination with adolescent romance does come to be a bit cloying, a couple of twists are repeated (I’m sure a bulletproof vest isn’t *that* bulletproof), and the one queer character is a horrible stereotype. The ending’s also a minor disappointment, lacking the boldness the story shows elsewhere.Still recommended, though. Enjoy the individual stories and characters, and the insights into the perceived dysfunctions of Japanese society.

In an alternate history Japan (now "the Republic of Greater East Asia"), the government randomly selects 50 third-year junior high classes per year for something called "the Program." Each class is confined to an island and forced to fight until one survivor is left. Each student in the Program is made to wear a tracking collar that not only keeps track of their vital signs and location but is also set to explode if they leave the island. They're each given a little water and food, a map, a compass, and a randomly selected weapon of some sort. The map and compass are handy, because every couple hours one new section of the island becomes a forbidden zone. The tracking collars are set to explode if they're in forbidden zones. They're also set to explode if no one new has died in the past 24 hours, so students can't simply agree to not kill each other. Program survivors are given a pension and are instructed not to tell anyone about their experiences.Shuya thinks his class is just going on a regular trip. He and the others fall asleep on the bus and wake up to find themselves in an unfamiliar classroom. They all have some general knowledge about the Program, of course, but none of them expected they'd actually end up in it. A man named Sakamochi tells them the rules and kills a few people to underscore that, yes, this is happening and there's nothing any of them can do about it. Then he sends them out one by one: the game has begun.I've owned this for a while but avoided reading it for a couple reasons. First, it's a brick of a book, and if the writing/translation didn't flow well enough, that could mean months of slogging. Second, I was worried it would be too gory for me.I can't comment on the accuracy of the translation, but it was certainly very readable - I sped through the book much more quickly than I had expected I would. As for its level of goriness, well, the first few deaths had me worried. Sakamoto seemed to relish shocking the Program participants, and the first few deaths were both casual and horrible. When he mentioned having raped the woman who'd been the caretaker of a couple of the students because she hadn't meekly accepted the news that they were now in the Program, I wondered whether this was going to reach Ryu Murakami levels of nastiness.Thankfully, either I got used to it all or Takami scaled things back a bit, because most of the later deaths didn't pack the kind of punch those first few did. A warning to those with eye-related phobias, though: there were several eye-related gory moments throughout the book that were detailed enough that I had to skim them. Still, nothing involving intestines, thankfully, and although there were mentions of rape (Sakamoto, plus a male student threatening a female student), there was no on-page rape.Nearly every chapter ended with a count of the total number of students still alive. The class started with 42 - 21 boys and 21 girls - and rapidly shrunk as the game progressed. Some of the students committed suicide rather than play along. Others found people they could trust and banded together, at least temporarily. Their different approaches, as well as the variations in their weapons (which ranged from proper weapons like guns and knives to "jokes" like a fork or a set of darts complete with a dart board), made it tough to tell how things might go. Just on the basis of who had the greatest amount of page-time, I was able to mostly figure out who'd be there for the final showdown, but some things did catch me by surprise.Many of the students were just names and basic personalities, although a few of the students were a little more fleshed out. That said, I didn't really get attached to any of them. There were a few who I wanted to see survive because they seemed to be both decent people and prepared for the Program (seriously, why didn't more parents in this world sign their kids up for basic first aid, survival, and weapons training, just in case?), and there were a couple characters I could tell that the author wanted me to root for. Still, while I did think a few of the deaths were tragic and sad, nothing left me feeling wrecked after the book was over. Maybe because I was braced for all or most of the cast to die at some point? I don't know.Of all the characters, I think I probably rooted for Hiroki the most, although Shogo and Shinji weren't too far behind. And even where Hiroki was concerned, I liked the guy but didn't think he'd actually make it - I mean, one of the reasons I liked him was his stubborn refusal to actually kill anyone. He wasn't stupid about it, defending himself when necessary and otherwise staying hidden, but it wasn't an approach that had a good chance of getting him all the way through to the end. Shogo and Shinji, meanwhile, were both smart, cool-headed, gutsy, and good planners (and both of them came across as being a good deal older than 15 or 16 years old, to the point that I wondered whether it would be revealed that adults who are passing as kids had infiltrated the Program). It was pretty clear, though, that the author wanted readers to root for Shuya and Noriko the most. Noriko was nice enough, if bland, but Shuya got on my nerves. He was one of those very dense "every girl loves him but he has no idea" types - nearly a quarter of the girls in his class had secret crushes on him. He'd rage against Shogo or others for being callous, and he seemed to have girls in a special category in his brain - it was always more shocking to him when girls were hurt than when guys were, and he was weirdly surprised when Noriko used a gun to help him and Shogo defend their group.I was expecting this to be a bleak and depressing book, but somehow it wasn't. There was a murder mystery-like appeal to finding out how all the deaths were going to play out, and the ending managed to be satisfying and somewhat hopeful. I enjoyed it overall and am glad I finally read it.As far as the Hunger Games controversy goes: I know that there were folks shouting that Suzanne Collins copied off of Battle Royale, and now that I've read both the first Hunger Games book and this, I disagree. Sure, it's a similar setup, but the books each handle it completely differently.Extras:A map of the island with a list of the various forbidden zones and the times at which they became forbidden, a list of the students in the class, an interview with filmmaker Kinji Fukasaku, and an afterword by Koushun Takami. (Original review posted on A Library Girl's Familiar Diversions.)

I liked this better than The Hunger Games (and of course this book came first), because the psychology is so much more interesting: the 40 kids on the island are classmates, most of whom have known each other for years, so they have all kinds of interesting connections -- grudges, crushes -- that affect their actions.

Battle Royale by Koushun Takami One of the dystopian classics!

I think this is a teen novel but being Japanese you can never tell. This is Big In Japan!---------------------Basic Scenario Without SpoilersSet in an alternative authoritarian future where a bunch of school kids get dumped on an island, get given a black bag with some kind of weapon in it and told to kill each other. There can only be one survivor.Various parts of the island become "out of bounds" as denoted by daily loud speaker announcements and a supplied map. Just to reinforce the point they all have a large collar fitted round their necks that will detonate if the happen to find themselves in the forbidden zones. Any attempt to remove the collar results in the obligatory explosion. If there is more that one survivor after 72 hours(?) all their heads will blow.---------------------An interesting exploration into solo vs collaborative attempts to survive and trust vs self interest.Sound stupid but is in fact a good read. Not quite believable, but convincing none the less.

The Republic of Greater East Asia was falling apart. Its youth were a disaffected lot and were often displaying such traits in increasingly violent ways. The government decided to act and passed the Program where 50 third-year junior high school classes are forced to fight their classmates until only 1 participant remains left alive. This story follows one such class of 42 students as they are abducted from their intended school trip and awaken in a strange classroom and discover their new circumstances. Stranded on a deserted island each person is equipped with a pack containing food, water, a map and an item classed as a weapon (anything from a machine gun to a fork) and sent on their way at 2 minute intervals. Will they participate? Can they trust anyone to make allegiances with and if they do there is the ever present threat of betrayal with only one person able to claim victory.This is a brutal tale in both the psychological and violent sense that the reader, for the most part, follows in the company of Shuya, one of the students. It’s not all violence and gore though as you do also get snippets of back-stories of some of the more prominent students to better understand their character traits. This helps keeping the who’s who straight, with so many of them running about initially, and adds to the feels when the inevitable death ensues. There are also moments of really black humour on show too (the lighthouse anyone?) which while not lightening the mood certainly add to the readability of the story. Even though it was never in the running for any of the great prizes for literature it certainly is that, as long as you don’t mind a bit of blood spatter that is.Since finishing the book I’ve also rewatched the movie for the sake of comparison. While there are a few differences the two are pretty much the same with only the ending having any real dramatic change. The film is definitely more OTT than the book but the characters lack the depth that you can gain from the written version. So if you’re interested in experiencing either then I’d recommend if you want the action then check out the movie but if you want more story to go with it then the book is the way to go. I guess I’ll need to find the manga now and do this all again sometime.

Mature-Content Rating: Mention of rape, extreme underage violence, mention of suicide, gore, language “What I mean is, even a dumbass like me can think everything’s pointless. Why do I get up and eat? It all ends up shit anyway. Why am I going to school and studying? Even if I happen to succeed I’m going to die anyway. You wear nice clothes, you seek respect, you make a lot of money, but what’s the point? It’s all pointless. But… but, you see, we still have emotions like joy and happiness, right? They may not amount to much but they fill up our emptiness.” Try to remember all the kids from your 9th grade homeroom class. The bullies, yes, but also the couples, the siblings, the bffs, and that special girl/guy that you’ve had your eye on. Now imagine the government shipping that class off to an undisclosed location without telling you or your family, giving you a bomb-laced collar, a backpack with supplies, and telling you to go kill your classmates or die yourself.The world of Battle Royale is a communist Japan; the government controlling everything including the music the characters are allowed to have and what’s allowed to play on tv. To remind the people of their place, every year a 9th grade class is chosen for the Battle Royale. A collar with a bomb is put around their neck in case they try to exit the battle zone; they are given a backpack with food, water, a map, and a weapon (that can be anything from an AK-47 to a fork); and are told only one will be allowed to stay alive at the end of three days.The main characters are Shuya, Noriko, and Shogo. While mostly the reader follows Shuya and Noriko (his crush) and the recent transfer student Shogo, other times are dedicated to each individual character. We’re given backgrounds, relationships, hopes for the future, hobbies; anything to humanize the characters and create emotional bonds. You know, before they start killing or someone kills them.Overall, this is not a book for the lighthearted. It’s gruesome, brutal, and probably nightmare inducing.

I enjoyed this book and think that it translated to English well. A lot of people have compared it to Hunger Games but I don't think there are enough similarities to make that argument. Yes, both stories have kids killing each other because of a "game" the government put together, but everything else seems different enough that I was able to enjoy both this book and Hunger Games without feeling like I was reading the same story. I liked how Takami told the story through all of the students' view points. I think it made it made it more personal and sad when that student got killed.

The book that the hyper-violent Japanese cult movie was based on. I was surprised that the story was actually not gratuitously violent. The violence is an integral part of the story: In an alternate-reality Japan, the country has been under fascism since after WWII. The government has reverted to an extremely isolationist policy, and citizens unquestioningly accept abuses, and practices like the Battle Experiments – in which random highschool classes are selected, taken to a small island in the Seto Inland Sea, and told that they must kill each other or be killed. The book follows one such class – and deftly explores the psychological reactions of the very different people in the class, as they react to this extreme situation.
The reasons behind these "experiments" do not actually have to do with studying battles, as the public is told, but are for control of the citizens at large. When the population sees that consistently, friends, colleagues and lovers WILL turn against each other and kill each other, this undercuts any possibility of a large-scale revolution against the government. The book is also extremely critical of aspects of (actual) Japanese culture that are against individuality, and that the author seems to believe encourage "groupthink." I think one of his main points in the book is that, although the reader might initially "see" a group of classmates, all the same age, wearing the same uniform, seemingly homogeneous, as the book progresses, we get to know each person, and find out their secrets, seeing how each person is different – possibly bad, possibly good, to varying degrees, but always unique.
A very interesting work – the one criticism I have of it was the translation. Too often, phrases, metaphors and slang terms seemed to be too literally rendered. The narrative never really "flowed" – at no point could I forget that I was reading a translation from the Japanese.

A stunning book that is clearly the source material for almost all the current dystopian fiction that is so popular. Hunger games is the sesame street version of Battle Royale and it is far more mature, nuanced and intelligently violent than most of what is available today. Each chapter follows a different student and we flick between them as they live, die, fight, kill or run. A little tough as an English speaker as many of the names are quite familiar and it is at times hard to distinguish between characters. This is my problem though and had the Japanese Author called the kids Steve and Mary it would have made a mockery of the whole thing. Stretch your capacity for reading by listening to this voice and pick this up.

This book is so fucking awesome. It's like [b:The Hunger Games|2767052|The Hunger Games (The Hunger Games, #1)|Suzanne Collins|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1358275334s/2767052.jpg|2792775] on crack. Seriously, when the movie for The Hunger Games came out, I was like HELL YEA! KIDS KILLING EACH OTHER! SWEET. But, I hadn't actually read The Hunger Games books. Needless to say, when I saw the movie, I was like WTF?? WHAT'S ALL THIS POLITICAL HORSESHIT!?

So, fuck Hunger Games. It's fucking bullshit. This book started it all. Kids killing each other for the world's amusement. From the very beginning. Well, there's like 5 pages of set-up, with the kids all in a classroom. The killing process is explained to them, and they are set off, into the woods to fend for themselves and kill every goddamn student they come across.

It's fucking brutal. This book describes the battle the way it really would be, if this ever happened. Kids would go ape-shit. It would be a total blood bath. Most likely, nobody would survive.

So, don't read that bullshit Hunger Games crap. Read [b:Battle Royale|57891|Battle Royale|Koushun Takami|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1331235272s/57891.jpg|2786327]. You can thank me later.

I decided to tackle this before Hunger Games. Glad I did. Gory, yes. A bit over the top, yes. Now I want to see the movie. Let me say this,beyond the blood and guts, there is a deeper aspect to this story. Its about government, society, etc. We should all pay attention to.

A difficult and often unpleasant exploration of how rules can change people. The characters adopt a wide variety of solutions to cope with the difficult situation that faces them, and it is up to the reader to decide which have succeeded and which have failed.

A wide variety of gratuitious and explicit violence is showcased throughout the book. Unless you are already insensitive to gore and horror, I do not recommend this book.

If you do not care to read a variety of philisophical rationalisations for evil actions this book is not for you.

On the positive side the plot is unpredictable and contains plenty of twists.

We will kill each other.
We will kill each other.
We will kill each other.

If I don’t kill, I will be killed.
If I don’t kill, I will be killed.
If I don’t kill, I will be killed.

'From a pool of third-year junior high school students, fifty classes were issued an annual death sentence. That was two thousand students that’s if each class consisted of forty students. No, more accurately, that was 1,950 students killed.Worse Yet,it wasn’t simply a mass execution. The students had to kill each other,competing for the title of survivor. It was the most terrifying version of musical chairs imaginable. But it was impossible to oppose the Program. It was impossible to protest anything the Republic of Greater East Asia did.'
A class of 42 fifteen year old Japanese students (50% male,50% female) are kidnapped from a school bus on a field trip to be taken to an island, fitted with collars containing remote-controlled explosives which will detonate if tampered with, given a pack consisting of bread, water, a compass, a map, a flashlight, a weapon (whether it’s useful or not is down to luck, banjo anyone?) and perhaps the weapon’s manual. As the game went on, every few hours announcements were made of the dead and new forbidden zones were introduced (if you get caught in a forbidden zone the collar explodes, say goodbye to your head) so as the number of pupils decreased so does the area in which they can hide and keeps them moving.

At the beginning of the book there is student list and a map of the island with a list of the forbidden zones so it's easier to follow. I copied the student list, crossed them off when they died, added how they died and what their original weapons were.

I found this really difficult to rate. There were both positives and negatives. Some really awesome chapters were filled with brilliant strategies and characterisation, on the other hand the high level of detail in describing computer hacking and rock music were not to my taste and bored me to tears. I tried to skip these.

The violence wasn’t overly done in my opinion. It was described in a few sentences then moved on. It’s gory but not so much that I was going to have horror-filled nightmares for days after reading it. The macabre humour became progressively better until I was chuckling at the way people were dying which I felt a little guilty about.

The personal stories of the students were intriguing. To see the psychology behind their decisions was incredibly interesting. I had fun totting up the victims of the serial killers, in fact my favourite characters were probably the ones to who “played the game”. Chapter 44 was pure genius.

Most if not all of the strategies possible to win this game were implemented by the students, some with more success than others but there were scenes that just blew me away. There were accidents, misunderstandings, suicides, self-defense and cold-blooded murder. Cause of death was sometimes hard to categorise, it could have been a number of events that led to a death.

However, I had some believability issues. First, the reason behind the game was unclear. At one point this is explained to Shogo as serving as a reminder to the people, that it was no use in going against the government, that there’s no point in gathering together and starting a revolution because the government will just shoot them down. This explanation seemed really flimsy, even though The Hunger Games uses a similar explanation - it uses it to better effect. The only real reason I could see was for the sport of high-ranking officials gambling on who would win.

Second, I had a hard time seeing the main narrator, Shuya live for so long. He wasn’t very practical and kept trying to save everyone at great risk to himself and others, and never learned from his mistakes. By rights he should have died early on but then this game is more about luck rather than brains and skill, which was brilliantly demonstrated by the author.

Third, the way in which the main characters were forced together annoyed me. I couldn’t see it, it was cheesy and predictable and totally not in keeping with the rest of the book.

Fourth, the stereotypical roles of class clown, the gay guy, star athlete and so on were all present but the teen issues had me rolling my eyes a few times but I accepted them because if you’re going to die all of those issues will become a hundred times more important than anything else, like trying to survive.

Fifth, the Terminator visuals I was getting from one individual especially when they were blown up was very unrealistic. This character almost never got injured. Speaking of movies, how come Mr. Tarantino hasn't adapted this yet? It's right up his alley.

Sixth, the ending. Hmm, I was really looking forward to something mind-blowingly (no pun intended) fantastic but I was disappointed with the way things turned out. I wasn’t expecting something that seemed so unachievable, no one should have survived the stunt pulled. The actions of one character completely going against his personality. It was a let down.

This is a Japanese-to-English translation, and a number of times that really showed especially at the beginning and became more polished as it went on. As I’m not Japanese there were some cultural references that were completely lost on me, and despite my problems with this book it still deserves kudos for it’s fairly original plot which no doubt inspired Suzanne Collins’ The Hunger Games trilogy which I absolutely adore, and prompted me to ask myself what I would do in that situation.

What would you do?

ETA: I've now seen the Japanese movie, and they made some positive changes. For instance, they gave a solid reason for the game, one that was very realistic. They also added a memorable scene where one of the girls checks to see if the girl she just killed was menstruating. o_O I still prefer the book though. Oddly, it was easier to follow.

I daresay it made an impression on me.

The Third Year Class from Shiroiwa Junior High School ride their school bus through the city of Takamatsu, the capital of the Kagawa Prefecture, not paying much attention to the fact that they were on a class study trip. 42 students -- 21 male and 21 female -- spending their time chatting and joking around with other while the bus wends its way through the prefecture. At one point, Shuya Nanahara (Male Student No. 15) notices a strange quiet settling over his fellow classmates, realizing too late that the bus driver is wearing a gas mask as Shuya falls over, asleep.He and the other students awaken sometime later in a strange room. The man standing before them introduces himself as Kinpatsu Sakamochi, their new instructor, and begins congratulating them on being chosen for this year's Program. Though all the students are very familiar with the Program -- every Junior High School within the Republic of Greater East Asia knows of and fears the Program -- Sakamochi proceeds with the formality of explaining the rules. The object of the Program is very simple: to win. However, only one student can emerge as the winner, and in order to be that singular person, the students must kill each other until only one remains. Each student receives a bag when they leave the room, containing food, water, a weapon, and a map of the island on which they are now located. At specific intervals, quadrants of the map will become dead zones, so they must pay attention because if caught in one of those zones, the devices clasped around their necks will explode.One by one, the students leave the room in order of their class assignment. And the moment they step outside the building, the hunt begins.The plot of "Battle Royale" sounds somewhat familiar, but Koushun Takami's novel was first published in 1997 and was immediately decried for its violence. And I can see why. Pitting teen against teen to fight to the death is horrific material. The battles between the students are graphic, filled with blood and gore, and on occasion, a bit of dark humor. One of the best sequences involves the hero of the story, Shuya Nanahara, waking after a bad fall down a hillside to find himself in a lighthouse with six of the surviving girls. Locked in his room, he can only hear the fighting and gunshots after one of the girls makes an incorrect assumption, which plays out like a blood-soaked comedy of errors. Takami makes it even more interesting by showing two sides of the students -- those who don't wish to fight, trying to convince others to band together to escape the island, and those who take quickly and easily to the game. The story evolves into not simply a bloody survival story but a psychological tale, showing how what we see on the outside of a person doesn't necessarily match what's going on inside. Someone who is usually quiet and unassuming turns into an unfeeling and bloodthirsty monster in such a dire circumstance. The story definitely won't sit well with some readers, but it's incredibly engrossing and I highly recommend it.

I knew about this book after reading a review on Hunger Games at amazon.com - some reviewers have written that Hunger Games' ripping off Battle Royale. The latter is much much much violent, but I just couldn't put it down. I finished it in 2 days, and even dreamed about it while sleeping. What makes it even better, I felt like it could've happened if I were to send my 9th graders off to some island and asked them to fight each other to death. I know that's horrible coming from a middle school teacher, but after observing the way my kids behave, I would've believed if some of them would get into the game, and eventually fight their own friends.

As a Hunger Games fan, it really surprises me that it took me so long to hear about this book. With the similarities, it seems nearly impossible that Suzanne Collins had never even heard of it and that huge comparisons were never made in the media. Really enjoyed it, though. More than The Hunger Games, which I suspect would be the case for most people, but there's still a spot in my heart for THG as well.

I love this book! It is a great spine tingling novel. The movie, manga, and the book are just plain awesome! It is like the Japanese version of "The Hunger Games" but better. I felt so much sympathy for the kids where they can't escape because of the collars straped to their necks. Also, if they escape the collars would beep and explode. Their feeling of having to fight each of their own classmates to the death because of the horrible government must obiviously be terrifying!

In this alternative, dystopian history, most of Asia has been taken over by a crazy Dictator. Every year, third year junior high students (one class from each prefecture) are selected to take part in the Program. This year, Shuya Nanahara's class has been selected. Now, they have to kill one another. Forty two students left for a class trip and woke up in a classroom on an island. Only one may leave...alive.

Before there was The Hunger Games, there was Battle Royale, published in 1999. Having read and enjoyed Suzanne Collins' series, I really wanted to read this book to see just how similar they actually were. Certainly, she must have found some inspiration in this story; it seems unlikely that elements of her story are so similar without some familiarity with Battle Royale.

The Similarities:

Dictatorship running a rather stupid Program to prevent its people from getting uppity.
A character who has been through the game before, won and had to go back.
Hesitant romance between main characters.
Zones that become unsafe to force characters into conflict, rather than just hiding.
Announcements on a regular schedule revealing who has died.
The victor receives a more comfortable life and TV coverage after the Program ends.

The Differences:

Battle Royale is perhaps even more violent. The kids here get a whole lot of guns and there are almost double the number of kids that have to die.
Since they are fighting classmates, the kids know everyone, rather than just one other person.
There is no way to volunteer to go in someone else's place. If your class is chosen, you're screwed.
Battle Royale has a less clear ending.
Battle Royale follows all of the characters, not just one, so you know what is going through everyone's minds.
In The Hunger Games, you are eligible to participate from 12-18. In Battle Royale, you are eligible only when you are in the third year of junior high (equivalent to a high school freshman in the U.S.).

Battle Royale was definitely an interesting read. And I enjoyed it, in the way one can enjoy something as grisly and macabre as books about young folks killing one another at the behest of a scary government. The story was great. Unfortunately, the writing is not. What I don't know is whether it is as poorly written (seriously grammatically incorrect and awkward sentence structure) in Japanese or if it was poorly translated. The copy of the book I have is the first American edition I believe, so maybe the newer one has been better edited? I don't really know, but definitely watch out for that.

Hunger Games fans should not miss this. Next up for me: watching the live action movie.

This was everything I wanted in a novel.. even if it seemed to be even more gory than I could have even imagined.

And while I see why it is compared to the Hunger Games, it is different in my mind. The mental state of the kids are different. The impact of the gov't in their lives is different. Kids all knowing each other versus being chosen and knowing no one. The culture of Japan is different than the culture of an post-america dystopia. Kids killing kids is the only thing that makes these novels similar. Both books are fantastic, but both books deal with things differently.

Short synopsis: story about a group of 15 yr olds who are "chosen at random" to fight to the death on a deserted island. This is sanctioned and condoned by the Japanese gov't. Only one can live.

Longer Synopsis:
So many people compare this to the Hunger Games. This isn't the Hunger Games, altho it has many similar storylines. But really? If you want to compare it to the HG then I feel you are missing so much of a 576 page book.

1. The gov't is totally different. This is Japanese gov't taken to its farthest and most absurd conclusion. You have the Japanese sentiment of saving face and not sticking out so far along to make it against the law to speak out against anything and to be killed (almost) instantly for doing so. The Program is considered an honor. To die for your country by your kinsfolk's hands is honorable.

2. Each prefecture sacrifices one whole class of students (up to 50 students) each yr. In the book they don't tell you how many prefectures there are. So let's go with the current number: 47. So 47 classes die each yr in this story. You (the reader) only get one version of The Program. The choosing of the class is random. It doesn't say how and when it is chosen. The students are not informed until they arrive at their destination that they are in The Program. Their parents or guardians are informed after they are taken. Anyone who disagrees with the gov't for taking their child is killed instantly. So students who grew up together, who know each other very very well are killing each other. It is a frightening prospect.

3. The Program is not televised. That doesn't mean they are not being monitored.. just that the horror of The Program doesn't reach the rest of the country. After The Program ends, a clip of the winner is shown with the statistics. (ie: winner: X. 40 students dead, 10 by guns, 8 by strangulation, 2 by infection, 10 by knife wounds.)

4. Each student is wearing a collar they cannot remove (removal will cause it to explode). The collar monitors heart rate, temperature, location, etc. It also records all conversation. The students are told only that removal will kill them, and that the collar will kill them if they are in a disqualified zone. Once they leave the first location it will be disqualified (so you can't go back and kill the Director or anyone running The Program.)

5. Each student is given a backpack that contains a weapon, a bottle of water, and a hunk of bread. They are also given a map with all of their names on the back of the map. The map has a grid on it that they can use to mark off the disqualifying zones. "Each of you has different abilities, so you will understand that each weapon will give you fair or unfair advantages." Some are guns (single shot all the way up to an uzi), others are knives; some don't get weapons, but protection. One got a fork(!!). In this "Program" they are put on an island that has been deserted just for them.

6. 4 times a day The Director reads off the names of the dead, and the disqualifying zones.

The Program continues until there is only 1 winner left. The computer verifies this and then the game ends.

Some students do not want to participate.. but the problem is trust. Some students DO want to participate.. they have past grievances, or they have imagined some slight, or they are insane. So anytime a student meets another they generally kill each other. One person I read online said that a student dies every 15 pages, and to not worry about remembering each student's name, b'c if they are introduced at the beginning of the chapter, most likely they will be dead in 15 pages.

Trust seemed the biggest over reaching arc in this book. Do you trust your classmates? Do you trust yourself? Can you trust a group of students? or are they a pack hunting others? Trust is so finely woven throughout the book you start thinking about all the people in your own life and whether you trust them enough if things happened and shit got real. I remember hearing Marjane Satrapi talk about civilization. She said "take away your lights and your drinking water and we are all savages." Similar thoughts apply to this book. Remove them from their society, tell them that only one must live; they all become savages.

I won't say this was an easy book to read. I was grossed out beyond measure. I am sure that watching me read this book must have been fun. I should have recorded myself trying to read and close my eyes, or not throw up, or duck a glancing blow from a two-headed axe. But I stuck with it b'c it was a fascinating idea. (thoroughly disgusting and very very gory, but fascinating.)

The end has a plot twist. OK, several plot twists. But they are totally in line with the theories of the book. And you wish there was more. But it is a satisfying ending.

Because of the new hype surrounding the Hunger Games and its upcoming film, I figure there’s going to be a lot of film snobbery about “Well, Battle Royale did it first.” Which, now having both read the book and seen the 2000 film, I really think that’s an unfair assessment of the respective books. Battle Royale is a brutal gut-punch of a story that treads much deeper into the heart of human darkness that Suzanne Collins only scratched at in her series.

Unlike many of the dystopic settings found in the current craze crop, Battle Royale takes place in an all-too familiar fascist regime, the Greater Republic of East Asia, that only resembles present-day Japan. There’s a quiet paranoia that lingers in the background, as many students relate stories of cousins or uncles or their own parents dying in accidents amid whispers of anti-government talk. And keeping the next generation in order is the Program, wherein fifty third-year junior high classes are chosen annually for a gruesome massacre, with only one student standing. This covers the particular program of Shioriwa Fourth Junior High, Class 3, and the consequences faced within.

The thing I loved about this book is that there’s a sense of anger and frustration bubbling underneath the surface as we discover more about the Greater Republic and the details of the Program. A lot of the frustration comes from Takami’s satire and criticism of Japanese government and conservative ideology, but aside from one lengthy rant in the middle of the book, it’s reined in and feels believe. A lot of the frustration comes from Shuya, the focus character. He’s a kid who’s been kicked around—raised in an orphanage, no one expects much of him, just found out that he is going to die. And his best friend Nobu has been senselessly killed right in front of his eyes. Shuya knows that there is nothing he can do to fight back against what’s oppressing him and it pisses him off that he can’t do anything about it, aside from survive as best as he can. There’s a few things that he can do, like blowing off his baseball team and listening to black market Western rock, which is the equivalent of giving the government supporters the finger.

Shuya’s love of Western rock intrigued me—most of his favorite musicians are name-dropped with a few lyrics, but one keeps popping up throughout the book: Springsteen. When I read the opening epithet from “Born to Run,” I got wary about where this was going to go. It could have been a name-drop of the best-known Springsteen song, but the song fits Shuya so well, especially as the climax ramps up and the game gets deadlier. The song’s about being stuck in the place you can’t get out of, being so frustrated at the world that all you can do is run. Yes, the final time Takami uses the lyrics is when we see Shuya and Noriko literally running away from the police, but it doesn’t feel like it’s being witty. (This is a personal thing, really; I was raised on Springsteen, so I get tetchy whenever I see his work referenced.)

Adding to that frustration is the emotional weight and consequences of what all of the characters go through when they’re forced to participate in the Program. Aside from two students (Kiriyama and Mitsuko), every character has to deal with the very likely possibility that they will die, and it will be at the hands of someone they know. Which then leads into this claustrophobic paranoia of who can be trusted—would a friend secretly stab another in the back? There are several instances when people die because of some slight that was committed in the past, and doesn’t feel like it should be important in the face of the current situation. And the paranoia just keeps growing as the book continues and there’s less students running around. A few characters attempt at banding together, but outsiders willing cause chaos and the result is even more bodies.

This is where I think Battle Royale is vastly different from The Hunger Games. In the latter series, characters mark and congratulate each other on individual kills. It’s extremely detached, and the only emotional reaction that’s ever seen is the deaths of characters we’ve come to know. In Battle Royale, the kills are personal and we see the different reactions of each person. Shuya makes an accidental kill shortly after the game begins and immediately, he’s repulsed and starts throwing up. There’s a few characters who snap and lose rational thought about how easy killing feels. There’s a few scenes that feel like exploitation and gore for gore’s sake (Example, one of the girl retaliates a creepy come-on by stabbing a guy IN THE MOUTH WITH AN ICE PICK. And the movie version of this scene is worse), but most of the deaths carry consequence and you feel like these characters are in shock that they’ve just killed someone or watched a friend senselessly die in front of them.

Aside from the first handful of kills at the beginning of the book, we learn each character’s backstory throughout the course of the book. In most cases, it’s right before the character in question gets offed, but there are few who get more development as the story goes on. You really get to know who these kids are, what they wanted from life before it bit them in the ass.

There are some problems with the book. The translation’s choppy at times, and the prose and dialogue don’t flow well on occasion. There’s also a lot of informational asides in the book; particularly, mentioning every single make and model of the various handguns scattered among the students. I could see why they wouldn’t be automatically referred to by the specific make, but a simple “automatic” or “handgun” would have worked better. I really didn’t like how Noriko’s character is treated—she remains a sweet girl who doesn’t get her hands dirty at all during the course of the game. There’s one implied moment that she may have killed someone near the end, but she remains very much the idealized girl at the end of the book, and I think it would have been better if we had seen her kill someone. The opening prologue referring to a leaked government memo disappears for the majority of the book, and the character most likely to have discovered this doesn’t do anything with it. The revelation about this memo feels thrown in at the last minute, as if Takami forgot about it for five hundred pages and threw in an explanation at the end.

However, I could not put this book down. It’s an engrossing read that still managed to shock and surprise me, even when I knew what was coming. I wouldn’t recommend this book to everyone, as it is extremely brutal and emotionally exhausting at points. I loved it, and would say that if you’re interested, definitely check it out.

I picked this up based on the fervor over "OMG The Hunger Games so totally ripped this off." And for the first half of this book, I agreed: I thought I knew exactly where BR was going, and how it would get there. It's the story of 40 teens who are instructed to kill each other until only one remains, and are each given a bag containing food, water, and a weapon--some as great as machine guns, others as worthless as forks. Early on some alliances are made, then broken; people are betrayed and killed.

But about halfway through, Battle Royale and The Hunger Games part company. By the end, I don't think it's the same story at all. It's a similar story, definitely, but BR's strength is that most of the 40 characters manage to be sympathetic characters. We get backstory on just about all of them, find out who they were before they were thrown int this crazy game, what motivates them to do certain things, and we even see their individual battles against each other. There are a couple of factions we return to multiple times, the ones who are clearly our heroes, but with only one or two exceptions we don't have villains. Hunger Games, everyone who wasn't from District 12 was a villain, someone to be avoided and distrusted, and that was easy because we didn't know who those other characters were. In Battle Royale, we know all these people--they're classmates, some dating back to elementary school. There are histories here, friendships and crushes and romantic entanglements, and that makes the killing that much more horrible.

Oh, and for those who thought Hunger Games was a violent book? Whooooooooo boy. This was absolutely horrifying at times. The gunfights were bad enough, but the graphic descriptions of hand-to-hand combat were particularly brutal. It's not the violence that's gratuitous, exactly, but the lengthy descriptions of it, and even that goes a long way toward world-building and accurately conveying the horror of the situation.

A bit on the writing: This is not Shakespeare. There's a lot of "basically" and "of course" and "in other words," and there's a LOT of use of the passive voice. Whether this is a writing issue or a translation one is a mystery to me, but you'll roll your eyes at the writing at least once a chapter, I'd say. (Note that I remember seeing at least 70 chapters here... start your eye exercises now, so you're prepared for all the rolling!) But writing quirks aside, this is really engrossing, the kind of book I blew bedtime by several hours for three nights running.

I had been wanting to read this book for years and have finally gotten around it it. It has a quick pace and I had no trouble finding the motivation to read it. I was saddened by the scenarios the kids got themselves into during the 'game' as well as by hearing their back stories. I felt hopeful along with them when reading their plans for victory or escape.

In the end, I thought it was a great book. Gory, yes, but when people die, it gets messy. It's not a YA novel for a reason.

In this blood and gore soaked tale, a class of 40 junior high school students is brought to an island and told by the fascist government that they must kill each other in an all out battle with only one survivor. This book is definitely comparable to exploitation films and literature, in which violence over storyline is key. It starts with a brief introduction to the kids and its main character Shuye, before launching almost immediately into the slaughter of the kids (unlike its successor Hunger Games, which has a long lead up and gives you time to care about the main character). So, as the first bodies started to fall, I was not fully attached or bothered much by it. However, this changes as the book goes on and each character is explored more in depth. Takami uses omniscient narration to jump from character to character. So that as the students wander the island, some looking to kill, some trying to just survive, others trying to plot escape, you get to know a little bit more about each one, including what their life was like before and why they are the way they are. (This omniscience also helped me keep the 40+ characters straight and helped to root the main characters in my mind.) So, by the middle of the book, I was definitely invested in seeing what the handful of good guys, who were trying to fight back, would do. Along with the overriding theme of distrust and betrayal, followed by bloodshed, there was another interesting theme that I'm not sure gets talked about much. Almost all the students had crushes on someone, and who they loved and who loved them was a conversation that was repeated over and over again. Several characters were driven by their need to connect with the person they cared for, but never said anything to, even if its the last thing they do. Even the main character Shuye is focused on saving and protecting Noriko in order to honor his best friend, who had a crush on her. I'm not sure what all this is supposed to mean, but I thought it was very interesting that in a book so filled with death that there would be such a focus on unrequited love. Perhaps it has to do with life and what we really regret when we leave it behind. I can definitely see why some people would hate this book; it is very bloody and bleak. But as a teenager I spent many of my days avidly reading the horror novels of Stephen King. They, too, were blood-soaked and filled with gore and I read them obsessively. Reading Battle Royale felt like a similar experience, in which I would sit at my desk, eying the book out of the corner of my eye and resenting the fact that I had to get work done instead of read. (Apparently, this comparison to Stephen King is apt, as Takami notes him as a great influence in the afterword.) Neither the works of King, nor Battle Royale are great literature, but they are most certainly readable and, if you're into horror, very entertaining.

An irresistible premise held together by serviceable, workmanlike prose make this a pulp classic. A group of teens are sent to an island by their totalitarian government for a battle to the death, forced to kill each other to be the last one standing. You can read plenty of social commentary into this, but the various stories of how this group dynamic plays out is the novel's real strength.

I enjoyed this book quite a lot. This being said it was quite a harrowing tale about school children being forced to kill one anohter as part of a government sponsored 'game'.The book flows well and the translation is excellent. I managed to read it through quickly, which is always a good sign of an enjoyable book!The ending felt a little flat, but this may be because I had rreviously seen the film adaptation and so had some idea of what to expect. However the ending was different to that of the movie.All in all a good story worth reading.