I'm a frequent visitor to the web site tvtropes.com. One time, several years ago, while on the site, I saw a page for a series of Japanese light novels that were translated into English, called the *Haruhi Suzumiya* series. I thought the premise was interesting, if somewhat weird, and read the first one, called *The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya*. It was... unique, to say the least, but still quite enjoyable.
Before anyone says this, I know that that *Haruhi* books are out of favor with fans of Japanese media right now. It's often mocked and folks love to turn it into snark fodder. This is due to a variety of reasons that are beyond the scope of this review, but it means the series gets some flak, and I think unfair flak, and thus folks don't give it a chance to truly enjoy it. Please consider giving it a chance if you find it interesting as described herein. Anyways, back to the review.
Let's clear up a few points first. Though Haruhi Suzumiya is the character that is the “focus” of the novel, she is *NOT* the main character. That would be our first-person narrator, Kyon. Kyon, by the way, is not his real name, but a nickname. So far, - I've read over half of the books - his name has not been revealed. So, you might be forgiven for wondering why the focus is on Haruhi if Kyon is the main character. That is because Haruhi is a reality-warping being, a god, or... something, no one knows yet, and the author is vague. Deliberately so. I think he's toying with us.
The story begins with a mental monologue by Kyon on how he used to believe in the fantastic, and wanted it to be true. He desperately hoped to find time travelers, espers (people who have powers due to psychic or other phenomena), sliders (those that go between universes and dimensions), aliens, super-heroes, so on. Eventually, as with giving up on a belief in Santa Claus, Kyon matured past these childish desires. Now, he just wants a normal high school life.
Yeah, given the description so far, fat chance there.
Immediately, he meets a weird, standoffish student named (you probably saw this coming, huh?) Haruhi Suzumiya. She announces in the class greetings (where everyone tells their name and such at the beginning of the year) that she wants any time travelers, espers, sliders, and aliens to come see her. The ordinary folks, she doesn't care about.
Of course, everyone in the class is shocked and confused by this statement, but quickly move past it and begin to ignore the eccentric student. Though Haruhi is smart, incredibly beautiful, a great athlete, and has many other skills, such skills do not extend, apparently to the social realm. Hence why everyone avoids her. That is, everyone except for Kyon, who strikes up an unlikely friendship with her. Really, it is barely an acquaintance, but for the strange girl, it is pretty much a friendship.
Just a quick note to understand this. School clubs are important to high school life. They provide socialization, and have other functions. They aren't always required though. That depends on the school, really.
Anyways, during their daily chats, Haruhi bemoans her inability to find an interesting school club to join, and Kyon mentions some spiel about innovation and so on. He comes to regret this pep talk. Somehow, this gives Haruhi the idea to start her own club, one dedicated to seeking out the strange and paranormal so that she may “have fun with them”.
Haruhi quickly manages to rope (read: forced, intimidated) Kyon and other students into joining, and that's where things get interesting. Our narrator/protagonist discovers that the other members of this strange club actually *are* the very supernatural and super-powered types that Haruhi wants to meet, but can not tell her. Somehow, Haruhi has either always had, or just recently developed, amazing powers, and the whole world could be undone based upon her moods. Therefore, these beings have congregated around her to observe her. Whether she is a god, God, or just some new stage in evolution, no one knows yet. Maybe the actual God gave her powers. No one can agree, but they all know that she has amazing, earth shattering powers. What's more, this eccentric group tells Kyon that they need his help to pacify Haruhi in order for her not to subconsciously destroy the world. Yes, seriously.
The above sounds so incredibly ridiculous, that it may surprise folks to hear just how good and fun this story is. Not to mention the type of best-seller that it is. Even with the recent blowback and scorn it gets from many, it still has some popularity. The reason is that the story manages to be thoroughly fantasy and fun, without taking itself too seriously into some sort of tract for the author's opinions on anything. It also crosses genres, managing to remain faithfully high school fantasy, romance, slice-of-life, and a whole slew of other story types, all at the same time. And it actually works.
The author is quite talented at how he does his characterization. This ranges from very vague for the characters (especially Kyon) to more in-depth for others. Really, in this and future volumes it is so interesting to see the growth in Nagato's personality, for instance. Haruhi has an overbearing presence that is the focus of the other characters' attention, and Koizumi and Asahina are not as well fleshed out yet. Likely this is due to them having agendas of their own, but it gets worse when we don't see their thoughts as we do Kyon's. Kyon is not reliable as a narrator either, but as he *is* the one whose pov is the constant one, we get some idea for who he is and his thoughts, feelings, so on, vague though they are. Of course, the fact that Kyon is snarky to the extreme and not honest with his own feelings hampers the audience's ability to get to know him, but that is part of the fun.
I can't really think of anything to complain about, other than that as this is originally a *Japanese* story, with Japanese humor and so on, there might be some comedic dissonance for other audiences. It might rub you the wrong way if you don't realize that much of the stuff you will find to be “out there” is humor and not to be taken seriously. Once you get past the “weirdness” (or perceived to be so, due to cultural differences) of parts of the story, you will really come to enjoy this, as I did.
Trust me, you won't regret giving this unique, strange, absolutely *hilarious* and fun light novel a chance.
Rating: 5/5 Stars.
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![The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya (light novel) (The Haruhi Suzumiya Series Book 1) by [Nagaru Tanigawa, Noizi Itou]](https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/51t+eAFYL7L._SY346_.jpg)
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