A Review of ``Pure Invention: How Japan Made the Modern World'' by Matt Alt

The book being reviewed has ISBN 978-1-9848-2671-8.  I learned of this book by reading the following
interview, enjoying that, and happening to find it in the stock of a bookstore I'd visited that day:
https://kotaku.com/the-designer-of-the-nes-dishes-the-dirt-on-nintendos-ea-1844296906

I'm not someone who likes Japan, not as others do anyway, but the book cost seventeen dollars, and I
figured I could at least review it later; the book is a leisurely read, though I don't recommend it.
The book contains little new information for someone even mildly interested in such Japanese topics.
This book was written in 2020, and this is extremely obvious in ways which I find to be distasteful.

The book is split into two parts: after Fall of 1945 and after the 1990s.  I found the first part to
be fairly informative, covering tin toys, cartoons, karaoke, cute objects marketed towards children,
and early digital and electronic entertainment.  The second part covers things school girls desired,
more cartoons, videogames, and Internet topics; I found this half to be much weaker than the former.

At several points in this book, the author ascribes trends or technologies to teenage girls, and I'm
quite skeptical of some of these claims after having finished the book; I've no reason to disbelieve
much of what is presented as fact in the book, however, largely regarding base things such as dates.

I was extremely disappointed with the eighth chapter, to find almost nothing of the interview I read
therein.  Masayuki Uemura has recently died, meaning that may have been the final interview he gave.
A commonality I noticed between this chapter and ``I Am Error'' is the mention of Japanese videogame
designers replacing that nature which Japanese land development destroyed with their virtual worlds.

I would've recommended this book, only slightly, had the ninth chapter been different.  That chapter
slowly devolves into discussing United States politics in increasingly bizarre ways, getting some of
the details wrong in a way which paints the rest of the book in a poor light; this is a book with an
entry in its index for ``misogyny'', both page ranges of which are to be found in the final chapter.
This may be the most recent book I've read in years, and I won't deign to begin explaining just how.

Rather than purchasing this, consider reading only the former half and setting it back on the shelf.
.