Archive for the Light Novel Category


Light Novel: Oshaka-sama mo Miteru: Hotaru no Hikaru (お釈様もみてる 蛍のヒカル)

December 2nd, 2014

hotaruThe path splits before you. On the right it goes straight up a steep hill, right through the forest in a direct route. On the left, the path is less steep, but it makes a wide detour. A young man stands in front of the split in the road, with a student notebook with a black cover visible in his pocket.

Kashiwagi Suguru is graduating from Hanadera Academy. Annoying as he is (and he is certainly that) Fukuzawa Yuuki has to admit that “Hikaru no Kimi” as his fans in the school style him, is leaving and Yuuki hasn’t had a chance to say “thank you.” Arisu is knitting goodbye sweaters, and everyone else seems content to let him leave the Student Council without any special  event – in fact, Andre-sempai has arranged a rock-scissor-papers tournament to give Kashiwagi’s stuff away – but Yuuki has nothing to give his important and influential sempai. This is the plot of Oshaka-sama mo Miteru: Hotaru no Hikaru. (お釈様もみてる 蛍のヒカル)

As incoming Student Council President, Yuuki is responsible for the farewell message on behalf of the student body at graduation. He’s warned that the Genji (athletic clubs) and the Heishi (culture clubs) are planning to prank him. As he writes the farewell message, a pressure builds within him to say goodbye to Kashiwagi. He runs around the school, looking for his mentor, at last finding him where they first met. He finally has his chance to say thank you. And to ask Kashiwagi who, exactly, gave him his nickname? Kashiwagi’s response is surprising – he had 4 eboshi oya – the Hanadera version of a sempai. (Just as Arisu has two – both the Yakushiji twins.) It was a former Vice President of the student council who gave him his nickname. As they part, Kashiwagi almost kisses Yuuki, but Yuuki stops him.

The graduation ceremony begins. As it progresses, Yuuki begins to get nervous. When he finally stands up on the dais, he notices that the room has become darker. And, suddenly, the nature of the “joke” the clubs were playing on him is made plain. Everyone has removed the red or white cover of their student notebooks that denote whether they are Heishi or Genji, so they, like him, are bearing a black notebook. Yuuki is moved deeply by this show of support for him. He realizes that this was the student body’s way of letting them know they are 100% behind him. He finishes his farewell and sit, dazed.

As he leaves the school that day, he runs into Kashiwagi once again. Standing just where the road splits, not thinking that he’d be seen by other students, Yuuki gives Kashiwagi the one farewell gift he has to give him – he kisses Kashiwagi. And immediately thinks that was his first and last kiss with a guy. ^_^

A chapter of his life is over, but as the book closes, Yuuki feels like something new has begun.

47 books – novels, short story collections, guides to the series, 8 volumes of manga, 4 seasons of anime and a live-action movie – later, the Maria-sama ga Miteru/Oshaku-sama mo Miteru has finally come to an end. Or has it? In the afterword, Konno-sensei says she’s not sayin’. The story as we know it is over. As Yumi’s story ended with Sachiko’s graduation, it fits that Yuuki’s ended with Kashiwagi’s. But she made no promise that she wouldn’t revisit Lillian or Hanadera in the future.

I had been reading this final chunk of the series a bit out of obligation, a bit because I wanted some connection, no matter how tenuous, but at the very end, Konno-sensei was still able to surprise and move me. In the end, it was worth every minute spent reading this book.

Thank you Konno-sensei, it was a blast. I look forward to your next series. ^_^





Light Novel: R.O.D., Volume 11

October 2nd, 2014

rodln11Exactly 5 years ago today I posted a review of the first R.O.D. Light Novel. Here I am 5 years later, reviewing the last volume of this never-to-be-finished series.

As we begin R.O.D. – Read Or Die, Volume 11, Yomiko is trekking across China with Ou-En; his boss, the head of Dokusensha, the deathless immortal known as China; her bodyguards the Five Sisters. They have been deserted by the deathless immortal Faust and are  being chased by deathless immortal Gentleman.

Joker is protecting the Queen, who is a deathless immortal, from…threats. Drake and his team are joined by Nancy (whether they want her or not) in the hunt for Yomiko.

Nenene and Wendy are in India, meeting a friend of Wendy’s, named Shark, an occult enthusiast, who is going to get them across the Himalayas into China to find Yomiko.

Bets on which of these plots gets wrapped up by the end of the book?

More interestingly, a good chunk of the book is taken up with a flashback look at how Yomiko became The Paper. Donny fails to carry out a mission as The Paper, and tells Joker that he’s just not into it anymore. Yomiko is known to the members of the British Library Special Division from a party  some years ago. Upon watching a video recording of the night that Yomiko and Donny danced in the Library (from Volume 9,) Joker realizes that Yomiko also has paper-user skills. He tells Donny to bring her in, where she interviews for a staff position. After an interview in which she vehemently states her love for books, she is accepted. She and Donny are assigned to serve the rest of the team their afternoon tea. (She and Donny drink Lapsang Souchong, if you care. I do.) Six month pass and Joker relents on his punishment. He reinstates Donny as The Paper, and assigns Yomiko to him as support and a protege. Joker discovers that his assistant Marianne is a traitor and has to capture her, (presumably opening up the position for Wendy when/if she returns.)

We have one last glimpse of Yomiko, flying on a paper airplane of her own making, across the Chinese landscape, vowing to resolve the whole situation peacefully, Gentleman be damned. It’s all about the love of books. Read. Or Die.

In the final scene we indulge in one last flashback. We see Donny entering his apartment where Yomiko sleeps peacefully (and naked, we are assured) in his bed. So we know for reals that they were lovers.

“To Be Continued” the last page assures us. It lies.

Well, that was fun.

It was an interesting exercise to read this book knowing in advance that nothing at all would resolve. But probably only because I know that ROD The TV exists and rewrote the entire story so it made sense. It vaguely amuses me that this book was published in 2006 and in all those years, Kurata Hideyuki had energy to work on Read or Dream, the ROD manga, the Read or Dream manga, ROD the TV and R.O.D. Rehabilitation.(all of which have been reviewed here in the R.O.D and Read or Dream categories)..but not the final novel of this series. I sympathize, but dude, you spent two whole novels digressing, you could have just finished it!

Ratings:

Art – Never any pictures of the good scenes
Story – 5 Exposition and setup for a climax that never comes.
Characters – 7 They deserved (and eventually got) better
Yuri – 0
Service – 4 A few scenes were we are are told in detais about torn clothing and nakedness. And Nancy.

Overall – This book, had it been the first of a two-part finish would have been a 7.

The series overall is still an 8, a score that rests solely on the broad shoulders of ROD The TV.





Light Novel: Miniskirt Space Pirates~Shikkoku Nanpasen, Volume 4 (ミニスカ宇宙海賊4 漆黒の難破船)

August 22nd, 2014

mssp4Miniskirt Space Pirates:~ Shikkoku Nanpasen (ミニスカ宇宙海賊4 漆黒の難破船), Volume 4 of the Bodacious Space Pirates series,  is the first novel of the series that did not have an accompanying anime arc – as a result it took me a lot longer to read this volume. ^_^

Volume 4 is also the first volume that engages in a little bit of space pirate otakudom. Instead of the seemingly inevitable long, lingering descriptions of sexy ships (which we’ve never had to endure, in fact) we get snippets of galactic war and the history of the various “original seven” pirate ships  – of which two are Marika’s own Bentenmaru and Chiaki’s Dad’s ship, the Barbarossa*…and the Hakuoh Girls’ Academy Yacht Club training ship, the Odette II.

In fact, back during the galactic wars the Odette had been known as the Whitebird. Although we don’t yet know how Hakuoh got a hold of it (except that former club president Jenny had something to do with it), there it is. Marika’s captaining a second ship, while club president Lynn sits in the seat for Tactical, manning sensors, radar and electronic warfare. During the practice cruise, the Yacht Club receives an SOS from another of the original seven – the Blackbird, which had been lost a long, long time ago, or so we all thought. But there it is, transmitting an SOS.

Marika consults with Chiaki and her father and they come to the conclusion that the signal is a fake – but why? Back at school, the Yacht Club is visited by the most suspicious character ever, a man wearing  a patchwork jacket and who is obviously lying when he says he works for the government as a tax collector, by the name of Jackie Celsius. Celsius is so extremely suspicious that Lynn, when Jackie enters the clubroom during a meeting, only introduces Marika and Gruier by their first names. Jackie proceeds to tell them a whopper about how they owe back taxes on the Odette.  Thankfully, Lynn is cool-headed and doesn’t buy it.  They send Jackie on his way.

This does not stop Jackie from trying Plan B – hacking the Odette’s controls. In order to escape “the hacker” (which they suspect is Jackie, but can’t yet confirm), the Yacht Club sneaks out of the midway station with an incredibly clever ruse. Marika pulls in a favor from the cruise ship The Princess Apricot, and the Odette leaves the dock in it’s shadow. This was a really good scene, full of fun tension.

Once out of the dock, Lynn turns her attention to reversing the hack and finding Jackie. Unfortunately, she’s unable to stop him from escaping her and getting hold of the Odette. Marika, Gruier and Lynn take Jenny’s Silent Whisper protoype and leave the Odette.

From this point on the book is intense and smart and impossible to animate, as almost all the action is talking heads.  ^_^ Damn shame, because it was a great story!

Marika enlists the help of the Bentenmaru, and they track down Jackie – whose “real” name is Jackie Fahrenheit, orz . His ship is cloaked by the gravitation of a red supergiant…and so is what may in fact be the real Blackbird. Gruier takes center stage, as Marika and Lynn work in the background to detach Jackie’s paws from the Odette. Gruier talks to Jackie as Communications Officer, keeping so calm and so cool and not giving herself away, even when he threatens to call the Galactic Police on them.  He gives up the fact that he’s contracting for someone…probably another insurance company, and that his real objective is to get to the Blackbird to acquire whatever weaponry it had.

Lyn wrests control from the odious Jackie and frees the Odette with the help of the Bentenmaru and a last minute ride down the hill from the Barbarossa. But Jackie himself slips out of their grip and disappears.

As the book winds down, Marika is pondering the genuine need to understand the Odette better and master her many secrets. “I wonder if we can find someone who knows about it…” she muses out loud. At which point a voices comes over the comm saying…. “I guess you could say I may or may not be that person…”

As Marika’s head explodes, the voice goes on to clarify, “This is Ririka, formerly captain of the Whitebird.”

Well, if Marika’s mother was the captain of the Whitebird, there’s one more connection between it and the Hakuoh Yacht Club….

Jackie was a loathesome, annoying bad guy – he was perfect. You have to despise him as he’s being super condescending.

Gruier was the real star of the volume, as her diplomacy skills cloaked Lynn’s cracking efforts…and I really cannot wait to begin the next volume! (I have to get through a few other things first though.) Ultimately, it’s the writing that really makes this series crackle. You keep coming up against things that could be handled stereotypically and the characters never do. They rely on their own skills and forge new, very exciting paths.

Ratings:

Art – 6 Meh. They still illustrate all the wrong scenes.
Story- 9 It got off to a slow start, but the last 100 pages, I was staying up way too late at night trying to get through them. ^_^
Characters – 10 The way these young ladies are written is perfect. We know everything about their leadership and decision-making skills, and nothing about the length of their skirts.
Yuri – 0 Except for brief mentions of Jenny, there ain’t nothing. waah( T_T)
Service – 2 Jackie gets a bit creepy. Which works, as he’s supposed to be unlikable. (There’s a subtle hint there, creepy=unlikable. ^_^)

Overall – 8

Captain Ririka! \o/

Skikkoku Nanpasen translates to something like “jet black shipwreck” in case you’re interested.

This novel is available on Kindle for those with Japanese IP addresses.

* Yes, yes, I know the official name is the Barbalusa. It should be the Barbarossa. :-P





Yuri Light Novel: Miniskirt Space Pirates, Volume 3 Cosplay Minarai Kaizoku (ミニスカ宇宙海賊 3 コスプレ見習海賊)

August 11th, 2013

MPV3The Light Novel Miniskirt Space Pirates, Volume 3 Cosplay Minarai Kaizoku  (ミニスカ宇宙海賊 3 コスプレ見習海賊) may have been even more enjoyable than the two arcs it covers in the anime. It’s a very close race, at the very least.

If you’re reading Okazu, then this was the novel you were waiting for. Are Jenny and Lynn as overtly a couple in the book as they were in the anime? I won’t keep you waiting. Yes, they are. ^_^ Having established this important fact, we can now look at the plot, which is once again similar to the anime.

The professional crew of the Bentenmaru have come down with an influenza-like disease carried by improperly shipped cat-monkeys. This would be merely an inconvenience, but the Bentenmaru’s Letter of Marque can only be maintained if the ship is properly hired to conduct piracy within a certain period of time. The crew is quarantined for a month, but the ship needs to do something within the next two weeks. Marika and Gruier take to the pirate’s hangouts to find a replacement crew (where they meet Chiaki’s dad, Captain of the Barbarossa*) only to find the perfect crew waiting for them at home in the form of the Hakuoh Academy Yacht Club. The girls jump right in and the adventure begins.

The first hurdle is the boarding and robbery of the cruise ship the Princess Apricot. This ship is a repeat customer, so things go relatively smoothly. And the cute girl pirates in cosplay goes over well – they are asked back almost immediately.

Having assured the Letter of Marque will be renewed, Lynn hires the Bentenmaru to rescue Jenny from an unwanted marriage. Jenny, of course, needs no rescuing, but arrives on her own, with a stolen vehicle. She and Lynn are reunited – with a kiss, in front of the crew. Jenny hires the Bentenmaru to safely escort her to Space University after negotiating a contract with the Bentenmaru’s agency.  Their agent Sho explains to the pro crew (as they reset settings altered, customized and hacked by the apprentice pirates) that the new crew acquitted themselves well on all three jobs.

Looking back, I’m really torn, now, to say which was better. Jenny and Lynn’s story gets more detail in the anime – all to the good, as we see them win the situation by making good decisions and using their brains. Also Jenny is set up as a business leader who will clearly own the universe soon enough. Also, I like the anime addition of Mami’s interest in clothing design as an excuse for the cosplay. (Mami was an important addition – she provides “Marika the school girl” with society, before she becomes “Captain Marika”. Mami remains her friend and supporter throughout.)

The novel has the cosplay scene pared down, but it sets up (and really, can only have existed to set up) Lynn wearing a knight’s costume to Jenny’s wedding dress. For once, there are extended scenes about the repair, navigation, piloting and equipment aboard the space ships – and I had to smile, because my Dad is an old-school sci-fi fan. Most of what I read as a kid was books that were 300 pages of that kind of ship fetishtry, with 20 pages of plot thrown in. ^_^

I also like that the novel presumes that Marika and the rest are going to figure things out.  Not that they are instantly competent, but that we’re not lingering over their incompetence as a fetish. They figure it out – and move on. On the other side of that, we’re not given quite as much time to watch Jenny negotiate the stuffing out of her Uncle, it’s all handled with minimum fuss.

I can’t honestly think of another series in which the female characters are allowed full agency so completely. They are fully, completely competent, self-empowered and present.

Ratings:

Overall – 9

Anime and manga, this series still impresses the heck out of me. It’s a really tough call which is better.

The next book is wholly original – I wonder if I’ll be able to make heads or tail of it. ^_^; I’m not going to even have a chance to start it for months, so don’t hold your breath. I hope to pick it up when I’m in Japan next fall.

* Yes, I know the ship name is transliterated as the Barbalusa. It should be the Barbarossa.  :-p





Yuri Light Novel: Adachi to Shimamura (安達としまむら)

July 17th, 2013

Of the several things I have been slowly making my way through, the Yuri-ish Light Novel Adachi to Shimamura  (安達としまむら) is the first I’ve finished. While reading it (slowly, so very very slowly) I ran a little contest with myself to create similes with which I could describe this book . Here’s the winner:

Adachi to Shimamura is like a trifle made from chocolate, limes and mayonnaise, with a red bean filling. What might have otherwise been a pleasant, if sugary, Yuri narrative is made unpalatable by combining infinite inconsequentials with utterly meaningless distractions.

***

Shimamura and Adachi are two second-years in high school. They blow off class and meet nearly daily to play ping pong in the rec room on the second floor above the gym. That fact is well-established in the first third of the book, then dropped and only briefly referred to again.

Shimamura and Adachi spend hours together every day and know nothing at all about one another. They have no conversations about their likes, dislikes, dreams, thoughts…or anything. When they are not playing ping pong, they sit in mostly silence. One of Shimamura’s friends points out that that is strange – then it is never mentioned again.

That same friend, Hino, likes to go fishing. Hino takes Shimamura fishing and introduces her to the alien.

Adachi has a dream in which she kisses Shimamura. After an uncomfortable encounter with the alien (who appears to be a child, but insists she is an alien from the future) Adachi tells Shimamura she likes her. This is about oh, 190 pages into the 240 page novel. She’s shown no sign of liking her, except randomly thinking that Shimamura’s hair looks soft 90 pages previously, so its like jellybeans on the top of the chocolate, lime and mayo trifle – random, and it doesn’t make it better.

Having established that Adachi likes Shimamura, the fact is trotted out periodically. The only tension in the entire book is when Adachi visits Shimamura’s house and finds herself wanting to kiss Shimamura, so she runs away. This is naturally followed by an extended scene with the alien, in which they take her around a mall, get her donuts and go bowling. And then the book ends.

The entire book had the feel of something written about an emotion by someone who was wholly, vastly unfamiliar with it. At no point did Adachi or Shimamura give the slightest sense of connection. In fact, the only way to make the book work was to presume the point was that neither Adachi nor Shimamura (but Adachi more) had any comfort level making connections with people. If we read it as if Adachi is disaffected and relatively emotionless, the book can sort of be seen as being about her shifting to care for Shimamura and learning to be friends with Hino and Nagafuji. But it’s not worth it. And it doesn’t explain the alien, the fishing, the ping pong, the Chinese restaurant or the bowling.

Ratings:

Overall – 4

I’m sticking with the simile. The individual parts are bland if used badly, yummy if used well, but merely perplexing in this combination.

Did I not explain the point of the alien? Oh well, the book doesn’t either.