(Reviewed by JD Jung)
#CommissionsEarned
“Even if the tides of time take to trumpeting tender togetherness, should we not remain alert to the dangers of praising love? Love is irrational. It is a dark passion that swirls in the depths of the human heart. Though we dress it in sweet words, at the end of the day, love casts off all artifice to bare its ugly fangs. And when it does, it forces us to confront our own insanity…”
How can a young man who expresses himself in such gorgeous prose, be so oblivious to his own feelings?
Our narrator is a twenty-four-year-old Kyoto college student, who in his fifth year, takes an extended leave of absence. He doesn’t explain why, as that would require self-examination. He refuses to reflect on his thoughts and actions, which is unusual since he lives mostly in his head. All we know is that instead of working at the research lab in the Faculty of Agriculture he is now working as a deliveryman for a sushi restaurant.
He continually stalks a woman he briefly dated, Mizuo, but claims that he is only conducting research. Though he is anti-social, he has a few friends who suffer from a similar “quest for a logical mind”. However, this pragmatism doesn’t stop him from humanizing his bicycle, Manami.
As the Christmas holidays are approaching, he and his buddies envy the joyful couples. Of course, they don’t admit to their jealousy and instead seek to wreak havoc in response to this “Christmas fascism”.
Tower of the Sun takes us through a hilarious jaunt with these outcasts. Every page will keep you in stitches, from the major events to the seemingly minor details. Can one figure out how to convert failure, heartbreak, and fatal disease into usable energy? Each action is accompanied by a hysterical thought.
Will our protagonist gain any self-awareness, get the girl, get arrested, self-destruct, or none of the above? You’ll just have to read the entertaining Tower of the Sun. Highly recommended.
