Archive for the Light Novel Category


The Magical Revolution of the Reincarnated Princess and the Genius Young Lady, Volume 1

April 25th, 2022

Anisphia is a very unusual princess. Awakened to knowledge from a life in our world, she has a unique relationship to the magic of her current world. While she has magical potential, she cannot manifest it at all. Instead she turns her energy to making technological uses for magic. And now, she has an idea, but she needs someone to test it out for her. In The Magical Revolution of the Reincarnated Princess and the Genius Young Lady, Anisphia gets her wish.

Euphyllia is a young woman who has spent her entire life training to be Queen. Poised, educated and a genius with magic, she is the perfect vision of royalty…until her engagement is dissolved by her fiance in a rather abrupt and public manner. Shunned and unwelcome, Euphyllia has no idea what to do…when Anisphia comes sailing into the hall on her magic broom, sizes up the situation and carries Euphyllia off to be her assistant.

Last autumn I ran out and grabbed the first Japanese manga volume of Tensei Oujo to Tensai Reijou no Mahou Kakumei (転生王女と天才令嬢の魔法革命) to get a jump on the English language edition of the Light Novel. Sadly, I was left feeling uninspired by that first volume. It was…all right. But, having now read the Light Novel, I’m willing to reconsider.

Anisphia is a delight. Forthright, intelligent, positive, she fills the pages of the Light Novel in a way that the manga didn’t quite give her space for. Her interest in Euphyllia is charming and, while not innocent, per se, isn’t creepy at all. It’s very much as if she’s trying to not fall in love with Euphyllia too hard or too fast, specifically to give the other girl room to have time to deal with her own emotions.

Because the LN takes the story past Volume 1 of the manga, we get to leave behind the too-much-shouting that filled up the manga and made it hard for me to engage with the story. Instead we spend more time with Anisphia and learn about her history, her skills, her desires and her achievements,  that makes her a very appealing person. Euphyllia, having literally been carried off by her, is overwhelmed…understandably so. As a princess, Anisphia has proclivities in dress and demeanor more suited to a woman of our world. A woman-loving woman, in fact. Anisphia is so daring and brave that it’s really quite impossible to not like her, as Euphyllia finds out, as she is swept up in the princess’ plans.

And that, in a nutshell, is what makes this book fun to read. You want to know what the grand experiment is and how Euphyllia can help Anisphia and you cheer for them both as they launch themselves into a grand adventure. As I said, now I’m kind of interested in reading more of the manga to see what happens.

If there is one sour note, however, it has to be the art. Anisphia is described well – she’s strong (we know because she literally throws Euphyllia over her shoulder to carry her off) , favors dress that is adapted from what a knight wears, she does not like dresses, although she wears a short skirt over her pants. And yet, what we are given in the art is an infantile imp…in a magical girl costume. My teeth ground every time I had to look at this moe infantilization of what should and could have been a great girl prince. Grrrr.  Thankfully, as this is a Light Novel, we’re not forced to look at that too often, so I was free to imagine Anisphia with arms like Gideon Nav.  ^_^ To be petty, the scene in which Anisphia shows off her Mana Sword, I said to the art “Tell me you have never seen a sword without telling me you have never seen a sword.”

The originating scenario is not at all resolved and we end the book having no idea why Euphyllia was canceled, (although I have created a scenario to explain it and I wonder how close I am,) so we’ll have to wait for future volumes.

Ratings:

Art – 5 It’s okay, but wtf is it illustrating? Not this story
Story – 8 Threatens to be heavy, but veers hard away from doing so
Characters – 8 Anisphia carries more than just Euphyllia away. The whole story rests on her
Service – 2 Less than the manga
Yuri – 6 More than the manga. This sets up Euphyllia and Anisphia as a pair that could become a great couple

Overall – 7 with a lot of room to grow.

For a cute, low-tension book, with a couple you want to live happily ever after  – perhaps in another world, where women wear pants – this is a nice read with some decent visuals and a dash of grand adventure.

Fine work by the team at Yen Press!

Note: One day later, I am listening to The Lesbian Historical Motif Podcast on the idea of cross-dressing narrative as a “portal fantasy” and I thought, art aside, that this is exactly what we have here. Anisphia’s transgressive nature allows Euphylia access to another world. ^_^





Watashi no Oshi ha Akuyaku Reijou. -Revolution-, Volume 1 (私の推しは悪役令嬢。-Revolution-)

April 7th, 2022

It’s almost impossible to believe that I have never actually read the Japanese Volume 1 of this series, but it is true. I had read some of it as a webnovel, when it was licensed by Seven Seas, before I had a chance to pick up the GL Bunko digital edition. I read and reviewed Volume 1 in English a year and a half ago, in fact, and then ran ahead to read the rest in Japanese, because it was that good. Until now, it was only available in digital form in Japanese.

Well, now Ichijinsha has licensed the series for a print release and, finally, I have had a chance to read the first novel in Japanese. Watashi no Oshi ha Akuyaku Reijou. -Revolution-, Volume 1 (私の推しは悪役令嬢。-Revolution-) was just as excellent as I remembered. Company drone Oohashi Rei wakes up as the protagonist of her favorite otome game, and decides to romance the villainess, the high-minded daughter of nobility, Claire François. Rae Taylor’s actions are ham-handed, but her experience with the game gives her powers and knowledge that offers many advantages.

Having had a year to experience the entire story from Rae’s point of view (and some of the story from Claire’s point of view) I can now see many things that were seeded to be resolved later…and some hints of the Truth (TM) about the world. It’s nice to see those things being seeded way back in the beginning. I know many more will also appear in the next two volumes. The overtly queer content still makes this series stand out from a lot of Yuri work. I’ll never get tired of that. ^_^

Ichijinsha did a great job on the book, with color dust cover, color character page up front (with hanagata’s original art for the GL Bunko cover as  fold out. The cover for this edition is a new work by hanagata. All of the original illustrations are included and two extra stories. The first story is from Lene’s point of view, the final bit from Misha’s. I think I’d love to have this whole story once more from Misha’s point of view, for reasons that are a spoiler. ^_^

Ratings:

Art – 7 Portraits of the people, mostly, rather than the scenes
Story – 9
Characters – 10
Yuri – 7 one-sided in this volume, but…
LGBTQ –10
Service – 2 Dressing and undressing, Rae acting like a perv….

Overall – 9

This print edition doesn’t add anything new to the story, but it gives us a definitive volume for lovers of this series. If you’re still a holdout and where waiting for a print edition in Japanese, now is the time to grab a copy. Although, I won’t lie, having the Kindle translate feature makes reading the GL Bunko volumes a breeze.

It will be such a pleasure to be able to give this series more space on my shelf. ^_^

 





I’m In Love With The Villainess Spin-Off on Sale in Japan Today!

February 28th, 2022

Last week, inori-sensei announced that her newest novel was picked up for publication by her e-book publisher GL Bunko. Today Heimin no Kuse ni Namaikina! (平民のくせに生意気な!)  is on sale as a digital work on Japanese Kindle and in Japanese on US Kindle.

This spin-off of the the original I’m in Love With the Villainess novel, follows the events from the perspective of the villainess of the game Revolution,  Claire François! Get a lot of insight into Rae’s love interest, learn about her close friends and watch as her feeling for Rae changes in real time. ^_^

It has not yet been licensed, but I don’t doubt that we’ll see a license soon enough for She’s Such A Cheeky Commoner! ^_^

 




The Executioner and Her Way of Life, Vol. 3: The Cage of Iron Sand

February 4th, 2022

There are two decent aspects to the The Executioner and Her Way of Life, Volume 3. One of these has been pretty consistent through the series, and one is newish.

In Volume 1, we met Menou, a skilled executioner whose job it is to rid the world of intruders from our world, among other things. We also met her obsessed and ultra-violent trainee, Momo, and an otherworlder, Akari, who seems to be a complete ditz.

In Volume 2, we added the Princess Knight Ashurna, who is not traveling with them, but they seem to run into her very often.

Here in Volume 3, we’ve added a new cast member, but, she’s also kind of obviously not really an ally.

Menou’s task is to kill Akari, but we already have seen that this will not be possible, as Akari has the ability to reverse time. Menou’s plan to travel with Akari is suspect but…much more relevant to us, the reading audience, we have seen who Akari really is.

So what was decent about Volume 3? The magic remains the most interesting part of the story and, in this volume, we have seen a new aspect to it; one that would obviously mean something to us, but not to the characters. I won’t spoil, because there is so little to really enjoy here that this is the one genuinely interesting thing. This leads to a second foreshadowing that really ought to be mind-blowing, but kind of isn’t, because it’s the only thing that makes sense.

Also on the positive side, I like Ashurna and Momo together. The fact that Momo hates Ashurna makes me like her more.

Both story and art are adequate, but not good. The story has an unfortunate tendency to just tell itself rather dully. “The meeting place was a white-painted pension in front of the waterfront.” The world building still remains so dire that the idea of trees anywhere is too much stimulus to handle. I still think the upcoming anime will have backgrounds that this narrative doesn’t deserve.

The art is likewise fine, without being particularly appealing. Breasts are constantly squished in ways that would be uncomfortable if I cared. Although the final battle illustration was exceptional for the series as it illustrated an actual scene, rather than just creepily proportioned lolicon women.

Unlike Roll Over and Die, the level of grotesquery is within my tolerance, so I’m pretty sure I’ll keep reading this series for something simple and brain-numbing to read, but will probably switch to digital. It’s very hard to justify the $15.00 for art and writing that is, at best, okay. Jenny McKeon does a very good job with the translation, and possibly gives it more color with decent character voice.

Ratings:

Art – Composition and body structures are all over the place
Story – This volume has less grim and more fighting
Characters – Still 7, except Akari, who gets 7.5
Service – Squished tits and not-adult bodies
Yuri – Everyone loves Menou

Overall – 7

Everything being a “guiding” whatever, as now lost much of it’s charm, but the new narrative pathway may make that relevant.





I’m in Love with the Villainess Light Novel, Volume 4

January 17th, 2022

When we left our heroines in Volume 3, they were in the Nur Empire, and we have had any number of massive plot points set up. So, of course, the first half of the book deals with literally anything else.

I love the first half of the book so much. ^_^

In the first half of I’m in Love with the Villainess, Volume 4, Rae and Claire will be dealing with important things like a cooking contest, getting dresses for a grand ball, solving two murder mysteries, and opening a forbidden box. There will be discussion of rights and lives for for sexual and gender minorities. And they will, presumably, also be going to school.

And, then, in the second half of the book, our Heroines of the Revolution, will jump willy-nilly into another fraught political situation and shepherd the world to a shape we could not have predicted. But, because I am in Rae’s position (in a meta sense – she knows what will happen in the narrative up to the end of this novel and I know what will happen afterwards,) I also know that none of it may matter. But that is for Volume 5. I cannot *wait* for you to read Volume 5.

Chapters here are short and move quickly, whether they are serious of silly, which means that both serious and silly items have an equivalent weight in the overall narrative. And, indeed, some of the stuff that is silly, will come to be serious in time.

One of the major concerns I had after reading Volume 3 in Japanese was the twins. They are savants, clearly, but in different ways. Volume 4 goes a long way to sorting their paths. I hope, after inori-sensei finishes her current work, which I hope you will all be able to read in published format soon, she takes a look at the twins when they are taking after their mothers in high school, causing societal upheaval.

hangata’s art has visibly improved since the first novel, but this book still favors character over scene, so we have a lot of straight-up character portraits with little scenery.

It will come as no surprise that I love Dorothea with all my love. Competent, impatient, not prepared to suffer fools, the only thing wrong with her is her disinterest in food. That’s a fatal flaw.  Aonoshimo-sensei, the artist for the manga recently shared their version of Dorothea and I just completely lost my mind – just perfect. ^_^

So, you’re all set up now with the world as we know it. You’ve met all the players, you’ve learned about Dana, Melica and Kiko. And you are ready for them all the return home. Volume 5 does not have a release date yet, but my gut says it will be late summer, based on the release dates of the rest.

I read this on Bookwalker because I did not want to wait – the paperback will be released in late February.  Overall, it is a good adaptation but, I have one teeny weeny quibble.  Sorry. I know translators have hard jobs and I’m not angry or anything and probably no one but me cares. I just …could not cope so I made a meme. ^_^ I will keep this meme, and probably use it endlessly for the rest of my life, because “translating” itadakimasu into another not-English language is my personal path into madness. My head screams “Why!?!?” every time I see it.

Ratings:

Art – 8
Story – 9
Characters – 10
Service – 4? Suggestive commentary, dress-up and Rae slavering over Claire.
Yuri – 10
Queer – 10

Overall – 10

Overall, this was everything was as fun and memorable as I hoped and I am now waiting for Volume 5!