"I've always had a soft spot for vagueness," -Takt

There are a lot of things going on in Sympathy Tower Tokyo, but the one that stood out the most to me is it's discussion on how we use language and how it's changed. By changing the way we refer to 'prison' and criminals', things don't actually change but people's impressions DO change. I really like the different ways this is presented. Sara, the architect, is obsessed with the abundance of loan words in Japanese and finding a better name for the prison tower than Sympathy. A writer in the book writes a who book on what kinds of language we should change, what we should use. The tower itself bans "comparative" and negative language.

I've seen a lot of criticism for the use of AI to write the AI character in the book, but it's really minimal and, honestly, kind of interesting. I'm not sure if it was completely necessary, but I do think it adds another layer of complexity to the idea and use of language, considering AI is not human,

This is really a book that makes you think. It's short, but it was NOT a fast read for me because I needed to let things sit for a bit. I liked the quote about vagueness because I have recently been thinking about how much I like a little vagueness in novels, and in my opinion this book also has a lot of that. I think Sympathy Tower Tokyo will be on my mind for awhile, and I want to buy a copy for my physical shelf.

I was originally interested in Sympathy Tower Tokyo because the translator Jesse Kirkwood has translated several cute books I have read recently such as Kamogawa Food Detectives!

This was not in any way cute with the first chapter casually comparing the building of a new tower in Tokyo feeling like r*pe

I then also found out the author has admitted to using ChatGPT in the writing of this book. I am disappointed to see this published.

Sympathy Tower Tokyo wasn't what I expected going in, and after having digested the book - I think that's a good thing.

At it's core, I found the book to be a question about how society sees the treatment of criminals, called by the public in this novel "Homo Miserabilis", and how society views prisons, the actual building that houses it's prisoners. Society turns a blind eye to the treatment of prisoners in prison as well as the physical upkeep of the buildings that house them. And since it's a general consensus worldwide that if you are sent to prison, you are being punished and therefore do not deserve to live "happy" lives or live in "comfort" - Sympathy Tower Tokyo asks you to question why you "believe" that criminals deserve these horrible conditions and when do they stop becoming human beings that don't deserve to be treated as such.

Overall, I found the book easy to read and the writing style was interesting. At the beginning, there were times were I wasn't really sure where the story was going. I really enjoyed the information about "katakana" words as well. We got to learn the main character's, Sara, personality in a very interesting way. I found her relationship to architecture and the way to describes her work and her career to be really interesting. Overall, the last act of the book is really where things come together and it becomes clearer what the purpose or the story around the Tower is - and I wished more of that information was given at the beginning.

I would recommend this book to readers that like slowish-medium paced books that are definitely character driven.

Full disclaimer: I DNF'ed at about 50%. It's a short book but I still feel like 50% is worthy of a review even if I don't necessarily feel like a star rating is fair. I am going with the very neutral 3 stars as a result.

I am not sure this book is being marketed appropriately? From the very start of the book you are told this book's focus is language. Seeing as this is an English translation of a Japanese book that deals with the complexities of the multiple writing systems of Japan and their uses, it would be very easy for this to be a flop. Honestly though, I think the translator and everyone involved in the translation and cultural components did a really good job explaining everything.

That being said, this book is marketing itself to being for fans of Klara and the Sun and Chain-Gang All-Stars. I have not read the former but I did read Chain-Gang All-Stars which deals heavily on how people view criminals, how criminals should be treated, etc. I thought this was going to be a lit fic dealing with the concept of nature versus nurture. We are told what happens to Sara, the protagonist at the start of the book but honestly, we don't deal with the tower, the public perception of "Homo miserabilis" and the tower, or really any of it. Everything is about language and being intentional with it. Which is ironic, because to me there is something incredibly dehumanizing about giving a new scientific classification to people who commit crimes making them no longer Homo sapiens but rather "Homo miserabilis." If that topic is ever covered in the book, it wasn't in the part that I read.

There is also the questionable use of AI in writing this book. I'll leave that up to the reader to decide. Generative AI does not have to be taught using stolen material but unfortunately most commonly used AI is. As far as I know, we are not told what was used in the writing of this book.

So who do I think this book is for?
I think this book is for people who are traveling and want something short, not plot heavy so they don't need to focus that closely, and allows them to question themselves on the use of language and AI.

Let me address the generative AI issue first: Qudan has stated that about 5% of the book was written by AI, mostly the sections where the protagonist is using AI to help her get out of a creative doldrum. I don't care how or where or why Qudan used AI or whether she was trying to make a point: generative AI is based on intellectual property theft. My own work has been scraped to "train" gen AI. It is a repulsive, unethical, anti-creative practice. I do not want to be reviewing anything that uses gen AI.

In contrast with Qudan and the protagonist's use of AI is the protagonist's resistance to the idea that language changes over time; she wishes to stop the use of loanwords in Japanese from other languages. This is what we call prescriptivism in linguistics: that there are rules that dictate what is good linguistic practice and what is not. I do not believe in prescriptivism; I'm a descriptivist. So here I have a main character who I find repellent on two fronts: gen AI use and her rigid approach to language. You can see how this is contradictory, right? But that never gets addressed in a meaningful manner.

To sum up: Author uses gen AI. Protagonist is unsympathetic and mirrors author's use of AI. Can I give this negative stars? It's really too bad, because there is some very interesting stuff about language going on in the book. But I'm only interested if I know it's written by a human.

In near-future Japan, all criminals, now reclassified as Homo miserabilis, are considered victims of circumstance and are treated with extreme empathy. They are housed together in Sympathy Tower Tokyo, a hyper-egalitarian facility with conditions so humane that prisoners prefer to stay even when offered their freedom. The book follows Sara Machina, the tower’s architect, who grapples with the ethical consequences of her creation.

Qudan’s novel is surreal and conceptually fascinating, but ultimately left me cold. Its unclear structure and indistinct points of view make the narrative feel scattered and emotionally distant. For a story so rooted in the idea of empathy, it’s curiously devoid of warmth – an effect that may be intentional, but left me feeling hollow by the end.

Qudan’s meditation on the evolution of the Japanese language is compelling, particularly the universal idea that “words determine our reality,” a theme that threads itself throughout the book. Still, whether due to Jesse Kirkwood’s translation or the source text itself, Sympathy Tower Tokyo never quite connected for me.

Note: in keeping with the source material – roughly 5% of this review was generated with AI.

Tokyo Sympathy Tower by Rie Qudan is made waves! Not just for winning Japan’s prestigious Akutagawa Prize, but for what followed when Qudan admitted to using AI to draft portions of the novel, particularly the "AI voice." That revelation launched the book into controversy: this speculative fiction is designed to provoke, regardless of where you stand on the future of technology in art.

Set in a future Tokyo, the novel revolves around the construction of a radical new prison called the Sympathy Tower. The structure aims to transform incarceration through space, empathy, and design. The architect at the center, Sara Makina, wins the bid based on a revolutionary philosophy from thinker Masaki Seto, who argues that criminals are not inherently bad but shaped by unjust circumstances. He dubs them "homo miserabilis," calling for society’s compassion.

Told through the interwoven voices of Sara, her lover, and a journalist, the novel is nonlinear in structure and very dense philosophically.

Qudan tackles architectural symbolism, trauma, and the ethics of AI. The result is not clear answers, but even more questions! Quite an exciting piece of literature

#TokyoSympathyTower #RieQudan #AkutagawaPrize #SpeculativeFiction #AIinLiterature #DystopianReads

A very curious book... And I can't quite figure it out. There's a very metaphysical and surreal vibe and I can see that the author is trying to make some very important points about language and society, age and perception, selfishness and social constructs, but I cannot figure out what the overall message is. Is this a more conservative book? Is it a true dystopia? It reads similarly to an Ayn Rand commentary which is off putting, but I stuck through till the end.

It's worth a discussion.

A grimly relevant novel in this day and age of growing reliance on AI and questions about what we owe to others versus ourselves. I say grimly relevant, but the book is not without its moments of humor and humanity. I had a blast reading this, and Sara is a fascinating and sympathetic character. Highly recommend