The Boredom of Suzumiya Haruhi, by Tanigawa Nagaru

This week I'm reviewing another book in the Haruhi series, The Boredom of Suzumiya Haruhi. This particular novel is a collection of four shorter stories rather than being one long story as in the previous novels. In particular this book contains The Boredom of Suzumiya Haruhi, where the SOS Brigade enters a baseball tournament at Suzumiya's insistence; Bamboo Leaf Rhapsody, where Kyon learns a little bit more about the incidents of three years ago; Mysterique Sign, where the SOS Brigade investigates the mysterious disappearance of the Computer Club president; and Remote Island Syndrome, where the SOS Brigade takes a summer vacation trip to a remote island.

Because this is more an anthology of short stories rather than a full-length novel, the book kind of wanders around a bit without purpose. The stories are fairly close together in terms of chronology. (This book is set between the events of Melancholy and Sigh) But each story is fairly self-contained so it feels sort of abrupt jumping from one story to another. As a light novel this book is pretty short and I read all of it in about four hours, which probably made it feel even shorter to me than other books that I've read as well. It just sort of felt like filler until you read the next book in the series to be perfectly honest. On top of that, these are all stories which have also been turned into episodes for the anime adaptation, so having seen that first I'm already familiar with the plot and it's mostly review for me more than anything else. I just don't have a lot to say about this book beyond that.

The stories do expand a little bit on the world and we get a little bit more information about various characters, but at the same time it feels like we're just being made to wait for more important stuff. Like it's a calm before the storm of all hell breaking loose. Granted, I am interested in all hell breaking loose, because that'd result in some conflict, but I feel like we're just waiting for that to happen. Granted, the characters are ostensibly working to keep that exact thing from happening in the first place, but it'd be a little more interesting I think.

Aside from the feeling that this is mostly filler, I do have two issues with this book, which come back to Kyon. The first is the author's choice, and this turns up in the other books as well, to have the other characters respond to Kyon's internal dialog. At least, it looks like he's saying this stuff internally but I have to conclude he's saying these things that are written as if he's thinking them because the other characters respond like it's a normal conversation. If nothing else it's bad editing. The other issue I have is Kyon lusting over Mikuru, which I guess makes sense because he ultimately is a hormone-addled teenager, but it frustrates me at the same time. I realize I'm probably just ranting at this point, but there you are.

Overall I'd say you could probably just skip this one and watch the episodes that adapted this book instead because you're not really going to miss anything by doing that.

- Kalpar