Battle Royale

By: Koushun Takami, Yuji Oniki - translator

Narrated by: Mark Dacascos

Length: 19 hrs and 29 mins

Publisher's summary

Battle Royale, a high-octane thriller about senseless youth violence in a dystopian world, it is one of Japan's best-selling - and most controversial - novels. As part of a ruthless program by the totalitarian government, ninth-grade students are taken to a small isolated island with a map, food, and various weapons. Forced to wear special collars that explode when they break a rule, they must fight each other for three days until only one "winner" remains. The elimination contest becomes the ultimate in must-see reality television.

A Japanese pulp classic available in English-language audio for the first time, Battle Royale is a potent allegory of what it means to be young and survive in today's dog-eat-dog world. The first novel by small-town journalist Koushun Takami, it went on to become an even more notorious film by 70-year-old director Kinji Fukusaku.

Download the accompanying reference guide.

©1999 Koushun Takami; Translation copyright 2009, Yuji Oniki (P)2012 Simon & Schuster

Took some time to get into this one.

Narrator was fine. Pronounced the Japanese names very well (Japanese speaker here). Reminded me a lot of Hunger Games. There were just times in the middle where I would have to rewind and re-listen.

Save yourself some time and just watch the movie

Narrator sucks. Shows zero emotion and could easily put you to sleep. The book itself is fine, but very, very boring at times. The Hunger Games series gets shit for ripping off this idea and if that's true, good for HG because Suzanne Collins made a much more interesting story. I hate it so much when the reasoning you get for these kind of 'battle royale' stories is "a social experiment" which is what you get here. The movie includes ALL 40+ deaths so it's not like a sugar-coated version of the book. The movie just cuts out all the boring shit from the book and gets to the point.

The most violent story I've ever heard

Would you consider the audio edition of Battle Royale to be better than the print version?

I might have preferred to read this story than listen to it because I'm not familiar with Japanese names. There are more than 42 characters in this book, and it was hard to keep track of them all. Though, I believe the author knew that it's hard to keep track of 42 characters, so they're also numbered (e.g. "so-and-so, female student number 11").

Who was your favorite character and why?

My favourite people are probably the "good guys" that we spend a fair amount of time with -- like Shuya, Shogo, Noriko, Shinji, and Hiroki -- but I also liked some of the "bad guys" like Mitsuko and Kazuo. All the characters were really fleshed out and seem like real people to me.

Any additional comments?

I decided to watch the movie because the book was so amazing, but it's one of those situations where they didn't do a very good job transferring the story. If you know anyone who likes the movie, encourage them to read the book, it's much better. And if you've read the book, maybe don't watch the movie. You'll just find yourself saying or thinking, "In the book..." throughout the movie.

The Hunger Games for Adult Horror Fans

Recommended For: Mature audience only, 18+

Review: Wow, this was awesome! I read quite a bit of horror so imagine my surprise when the gore in this book made me queasy. Can't say that's ever happened before. While technically the entire book is pretty gruesome, after a while its not so shocking. I do agree with the others that the beginning is terribly confusing with all of the similar names, but of course as the story goes on it gets easier. The suspense is incredible and unlike other books that shift to someone else's point of view just to build suspense, Battle Royale only switched when it enhanced the story. For those interested in reading because of the similarities to The Hunger Games, be advised Battle Royale makes The Hunger Games seem preschool appropriate.

As for the audio edition, I thought the narrator did a wonderful job. It was refreshing just hearing the book read without awful accents etc. distracting me from the story. However I did have trouble with it skipping often so I had to do quite a bit of rewinding to catch what I had missed. I would have returned it but I hoped it would get better and then I was too engrossed with the story to stop. It skipped on both my kindle and my phone.

Emotionless Narrator

The story is incredible, but I can not stand the narrator. He’s so lifeless and dead.

Did not love the narration

Would you say that listening to this book was time well-spent? Why or why not?

As with all audiobooks, the narrator can make the difference. For this book, a battle to the death, the reader was far too subdued. There was no real inflection throughout, and the story become monotonous over the 19+ hours.

While the concept of the book is entertaining, the execution was anything but. However, the 3-stars was earned for the twists offered by the author.

Would you recommend Battle Royale to your friends? Why or why not?

I think this book would be better if read yourself. The audiobook version seemed to take the life out of the story for me.

What do you think the narrator could have done better?

see above

If this book were a movie would you go see it?

Yes, I plan to see the movie version

Better than Hunger games.

Battle royale, a story about 42 students suddenly forced to kill each other until 1 remains, preceded Hunger Games, a similar story by nearly 9 years but is better in every conceivable way. If you like hunger games you will like battle Royale.

Fast paced, engrossing, albeit extremely violent

As crazy as this will sound, if I'd known about this book as a young adult I would have become an avid reader at a mich younger age

Masterpiece

Read the Manga, watched the movie, now read the book. Tearful. Amazing. Sad. Sorrowful. Nail-biting.

something missing

decent story, but poor translation? and monotone narration .think something was "lost in translation" barely finished it