I finished 『ひと』!

 

Now that I've read the last chapter of 『ひと』I want to share my thoughts:

Story

I have mixed feelings. Slice of life stories are nice and relaxing to read from time to time but, unfortunately, I struggled to motivate myself to continue reading. I can see the value of this kind of story, however,  I missed interesting twists, unusual events, challenges that the main character needs to overcome, etc. (=anything that would make me curious) To be fair, it's not that the main character doesn't has any goals nor problems, far from it. But they are so … normal. I usually prefer interesting and exciting stories. Mystery, action, suspense, thriller... you name it. That's why slice of life is a bit boring for my taste.

However, this is just my personal taste and has nothing to do with the quality of the book itself! Although it was not a page turner for me, it's not that I dislike the story. I think it's a nice slice of life story. 

The first chapter introduces the protagonist, his difficult life situation, his past and several other characters. The books reveals gradually more and more details about the protagonist and other characters in a natural way. I liked the pleasant writing style and storytelling. 

To me, the story and characters felt very realistic. It was not like the dramatic, exciting and exaggerated stories I'm used to (and usually prefer). Reading this book rather feels like watching normal people like you and me living their normal life: You learn about their struggles, see how they are building relationships and how they are trying to find their way in life.

Most of the time I had the impression that the main character didn't know what to do with his life (I think many people can relate to that). He didn't have much confidence in himself and his abilities. In chapter 3, things changed a bit thanks to people around him. They encouraged him to believe in his abilities which opened new paths for him (I'm very vague here to avoid spoilers). I was curious which path the main character will choose. During the last chapter, the protagonist made some surprising decisions. It seemed like he became a bit more confident and optimistic and finally realized what is important to him at this point in life. Especially the last page was a big surprise for me.

It's a bit sad, though. The end made me more curious what will happen next than the other chapters before.   

Difficulty

The level of difficulty was okay. I had to look up many words and didn't understand every detail but most of the time I was able to follow the story. Only scenes with descriptions of different kinds of meals and other cooking and work related things were quite difficult because of my lack of vocabulary in these areas. 

I think this novel is a bit difficult but not too hard to read. Compared to other novels, most sentences are surprisingly short. So even though there were words I didn't know the sentences were not very complicated.

I was able to follow the story but I felt that I missed lots of nuances that are important to really understand the appeal of the story. At this point, I've read two or three books where I had the same feeling. In other books, this doesn't matter too much. Understanding what is happening is usually enough to enjoy the book. But there are books where I have this vague feeling that following the story itself is not enough. That's why reading these books felt ... unsatisfying. I'm not sure how to describe it. Did you experience something similar?

Anyway, I still have a lot to learn. And since I'm not a big fan of slice of life stories, please take my thoughts with a grain of salt. I just described how I personally experienced reading the book at my current level. This genre may not be my cup of tea but I think it's a nice story that makes you think about life.