Book guide
Battle Royale
A class of junior high students is forced into a brutal kill-or-be-killed game on a deserted island in dystopian Japan.
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About Battle Royale
In a dystopian future Japan, forty-two junior high school students are outfitted with weapons and bid to kill one another until there is only one left standing. Koushun Takami's notorious high-octane thriller envisions a nightmare scenario: a class of junior high school students is taken to a deserted island where, as part of a ruthless authoritarian program, they are provided arms and forced to kill until only one survivor is left standing. Criticized as violent exploitation when first published in Japan—where it became a runaway best seller—Battle Royale is a Lord of the Flies for the 21st century, a potent allegory of what it means to be young and (barely) alive in a dog-eat-dog world.
Reading signals
- Spice
- None
- Darkness
- Extreme
- Pacing
- Fast
Content warnings
- graphic violence
- murder
- child death
- sexual assault/rape mentions
- suicide
- coercion
- misogyny
- ableism/ableist language
- attempted sexual assault
