re: Cloud Atlas not doing as well as I hoped

I finished the book a month ago and it was great. The first half can be slightly boring however the second half of the stories are great. The main theme, or at least one of them, is how man has the natural instinct to take advantage of weaker humans. Each story has someone using another character and exploiting them for their benefit.

Six stories go chronologically and then cycle backwards towards the initial first story. It's going to be hard to translate, but I really enjoyed the book.