Train Man

Review

What a strange book to try and review. I think Train Man is a very interesting work in the abstract. I think few people realize how important ch2 and its decedents are to the fabric of internet culture (for good and for ill). And I do think this novel captures some of that, whoever had to typeset all the ASCII art deserves some kind of publishing award. But frankly it really doesn't work. Reading a novel that is written as forum posts doesn't really offer much payoff here, it does convey the feel of reading a forum thread. But that's about it, and the trade off is that it can be somewhat annoying to read and moves at a glacial pace for how fast you can read it. At the end of the day the biggest issue might be how damn boring the story is. It's really girl meets boy, boy saves girl, girl buys boy teacups, boy gets haircut, boy and girl live happily ever after. There is nothing there. There are TV and movie adaptations and I hope they run with what is only hinted at here, that while the guy is a nerd who doesn't know how to talk to women, the woman also has her own issues. It's hinted at a little throughout the book and directly addressed at the end, but as there is so little actual time spent on the characters you never get this developed and it's left hanging as the only interesting plot thread. All that said, I'm not unhappy I read this. It is very much an artifact of a very specific time on the internet, and I think one that has passed. It's also certainly a book that was a big hit in Japan based on it's story already being well known, but I can't imagine people liked it much? There just isn't anything here.

Consumption history1

1. Mar 31, 2021

   Completed★ 2 / 5

   physical