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Reviews

Villains Are Destined to Die, Vol. 1

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By Gwon Gyeoeul and JINSA. Released in Japan by D&C Media. Released in North America by Ize Press. Translated by Tapas Entertainmnt Inc.

I have not really dipped my toe too much into the Korean end of the villainess market. I generally have an allergy to vertically scrolling titles that I blame on being old, and aside from taking a look at Beware the Villainess, which runs on the deep rage of the heroine, I had not been taking in the manwha/webtoon end of the genre. But I saw that this also had a novel coming out, and I like text, so I decided to give it a try. It’s decent enough, though it definitely lives and dies on how much you like the heroine, who can be a lot, especially in this first book. I was actually reminded a bit of I Swear I Won’t Bother You Again!, as abuse in a past life leads to the actions the heroine takes in this life. In the case of Villains Are Destined to Die, though, the past abuse was in Korea, and this new “villainess” runs far more on bitter cynicism than anything else.

The premise will be familiar to many: Our unnamed heroine stumbles across a mobile game called Daughter of the Duke’s Super Love Project, and gets obsessed with it, particularly the Hard Mode, where you play as the adopted daughter who is the villainess in the Normal Mode of the game. In fact, she tries to hard to beat the ending she apparently dies, and finds herself in the body of Penelope Eckhart. Her family now hate her, the servants despise and abuse her, and if she doesn’t do anything she’s going to be tortured and executed within a year. Fortunately, she has her knowledge of the game – though she never got close to winning hard mode – so this shouldn’t be too difficult… except that she’s only given three option dialogue trees, and they’re all terrible options.

Fortunately, and this happens almost immediately so it’s not much of a spoiler, she gains the ability to turn off the “you have three bad options” screen fairly quickly. She does still see affection meters, though, which are all so abysmal you wonder what Penelope was like before our heroine”s reincarnated self took over. We gradually find out, and it turns out that the heroine and Penelope have a lot in common in terms of how they grew up – which makes things more interesting, as the influence of her past abuse makes this new Penelope far too distrusting and bitter, and a few times she shoots herself in the foot in her efforts to save herself. She also has the same issue a lot of these reincarnated villainesses have, which is she sees this world as a game, and doesn’t see the others as people. She’s got a tough road ahead of her, even if she is softening a bit by the end of this book.

I didn’t even mention the men in the series – angry brother 1, angry brother 2, yandere crown prince, mysterious sorcerer, and grateful slave. That said, I also didn’t mention the game’s heroine, who has not even shown up yet by the end of this volume. Villainess fans who want something a bit more bitter may find this to their liking.

Witches Can’t Be Collared, Vol. 1

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By Yuri Yumemi and Wata. Released in Japan as “Majo ni Kubiwa wa Tsukerarenai” by Dengeki Bunko. Released in North America by Yen On. Translated by Andrew Cunningham.

One thing that I tend to do on social media is that every month, I post a screencap of an Excel Spreadsheet showing my light novel preorders. This is meant as an amusing gag to show off that I frankly read far too many Japanese light novels, and I should be reading fewer of them. That said, sometimes it gets noticed by translators who happen to see their book isn’t there, and they say “hey, why aren’t you getting this new series?” Inevitably, my answer is something along the lines of “it’s not really my genre”. This happened a while back with Playing Death Games to Put Food on the Table, and while I had to admit that the first volume was very well done, I didn’t really read more of it because I’m not a fan of death game books. This new series is a police procedural, and after reading it I admit that the reasons that I was told to read it are valid. It’s quite fun in a lot of spots. Nevertheless.

Rogue Macabesta is a detective in a world that is basically “My Hero Academia but with magic instead of quirks”, which means it’s his job to hunt down villains who use magic for crime. He’s finally done enough, and been noticed enough, that he’s about to be promoted to a desk job. Honestly, he trips all sorts of flags about retiring, so it should not be a surprise that his boss has a new mission for him. There’s a serial killer no one can catch, who is aging and de-aging people to death, and she wants him to catch the culprit. Using the witches of the 6th District, who are all hundreds of years old and have slaughtered thousands. They’re all sociopaths, though this being a light novel that mostly means they’re sociopaths in amusing eccentric ways. Can he and Miseria, who can control people like puppets, get along enough to find the killer?

The witches are a lot of fun, especially Miseria, who I would hate to have to deal with in real life, but as a character she’s great. being an obnoxious tease and also knowing exactly what buttons to push to irritate Rogue. That said, all the other witches note that compared to their previous detectives they’ve worked with (who are all dead), she’s really taken a liking to him. Catherine, the other major witch we meet this time around, is essentially the chronic pathetic wet girl that you see in series like these – think Yunyun – but that changes fast. I wasn’t too surprised by the change, but it was handled well. So what’s wrong with the series? Nothing, except it is indeed a police procedural, meaning most of it is finding bodies, searching for clues, interrogating folks, and finding more bodies. Also, the author straight up says this is The Silence of the Lambs but with magic rather than cannibalism, which, again, not a selling point for me.

If you do enjoy this genre, and don’t mind some snarky amoral girls taking over the pages, this is absolutely right up your alley.

The World’s Strongest Witch: I’m Starting My Free Life in a World Where Only I Can See the Online Strategy Guide, Vol. 1

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By Mochimaru Sakaki and riritto. Released in Japan as “Sekai Saikyou no Majo, Hajimemashita: Watashi dake “Kouryaku Site” wo Mireru Sekai de Jiyuu ni Ikimasu” by SQEX Novels. Released in North America by Yen On. Translated by Phil Charbonneau.

This was one I took a flyer on because it sounded very silly. It’s always dangerous when you try to read a comedy, or a book that’s trying to be “zany”. You need to commit to the bit. But you also have to be careful not to drive off your readership without something too out there. This comes close, and I admit may not be for everyone, but I was quite pleased with how it turned out, because it is absolutely ludicrous. It takes its basic idea and does all the dumb things you’d want a book like this to do. Unlike Bofuri (and more on this later, but I guarantee Bofuri will be what you think of once you start this), the main character is part of this world. Also unlike Bofuri, there is no one with common sense to tell her when she’s being too ridiculous, just NPCs who are absolutely agog.

Lorna Hermit used to be Lorna Guugelheit, and spent most of her childhood ensconced in her family’s mansion and totally ignorant of anything they did. But then she manifests the skill that all these “sort of based on a game” worlds have people do, and it turns out to be SSS-Ranked. Her family is horrified! Skills go from A to G! To have her skill be SSS, it must be ludicrously bad if it’s that late in the alphabet! Needless to say, she is thrown out of the family and dumped in the incredibly dangerous forest at the edge of her domain. Then she actually figures out what her skill does… she can access the wiki page for her world, which turns out to be a game! Not that she knows this, all she knows is that the “gods” are giving her helpful hints on where the monsters and valuable herbs are. Unfortunately, she immediately gets the endgame “most powerful weapon” – by wiki searching – and so is just a LITTLE bit overpowered…

Lorna will remind you of Maple quite a bit, to be honest, but by the end of the volume I was struck by the fact that this is a secret villainess story. Noble girl thrown out of her family, who all turn out to be not-so-secretly evil. She goes to the nearby town to make a life for herself and dazzles everyone around her. But if I’m being honest, this series is really for those who like Kuma Bear and Make My Abilities Average but wishes there were fewer 8-year-olds and more magic battles. Lorna is a classic airhead, so keeps using the smallest spell she can think of, even when with her MP the smallest spell can still take out top-tier bosses. Antagonists see how thick her mana is and drop to their knees in terror. Best of all is the internet skill itself. Lorna deals with popup malware, cryptocurrency, and comment trolls telling her to take off her panties. She thinks it’s the gods speaking to her. By the end of the volume, even the elves believe commenters are using slang of the gods, and adopt it themselves. This book is ridiculous.

So, not for everyone, but I had a ball. I will definitely check out a second book, though this risks getting old fast. Also, terrific pun that I missed until the very end of the book.

Banished from the Hero’s Party, I Decided to Live a Quiet Life in the Countryside, Vol. 14

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By Zappon and Yasumo. Released in Japan as “Shin no Nakama ja Nai to Yuusha no Party wo Oidasaretanode, Henkyou de Slow Life Surukoto ni Shimashita” by Kadokawa Sneaker Bunko. Released in North America by Yen On. Translated by Dale DeLucia.

I admit I had sort of hoped that this volume would be entirely devoted to Red and Rit’s wedding, given the cover. And there are a few bits with everyone being really happy for them, getting the wedding dress made, etc. And yes, it does end with the wedding. But sadly this has always been a slow life series where the slow life struggles against the rest of the universe trying to drag everyone back into its troubles, and so the bulk of this book is trying to resolve the demons and God. That said, how it’s resolved ends up being pretty slow life in the end, as it’s just Red using… not his blessing, because that’s the whole point, but winning by being clever and strong. I am hoping, though, that this is the last we see of both sides of the conflict, and that the honeymoon volume (the final one) really is slow life.

A letter arrives from Yarandrala saying that she’s coming back to Zoltan. As such, Red and Rit realize that the time has finally come to set a date for their wedding. They’re try to keep the news quiet… which lasts about three seconds till everyone they know is screaming “they’re finally getting married?!?”. Unfortunately, there’s a nasty cold going around… or is it just a cold? Investigating, Red finds a mysterious plant near where the tomb they raided was. He also finds the demon lord and his aide, who Red and Rit have a long history with. We’re told that they’re trying to be heroes now, and certainly they’re saving villages and giving good advice about the sickness… but can they be trusted? And will Demis simply give up and let Ruti live her own life?

Demis has never been anyone’s favorite, and I think that applies to the readers as well as to the cast of the series. Here they possess a long-forgotten minor villain, Eremite, in order to make their point. Unfortunately for Demis, as with a lot of gods in fantasy series like this, they’ve long since lost the “I must help humanity because it’s the right thing to do” part of their godhood and are left with the “why does everyone not simply do exactly what I want them to?”. It feels thematically appropriate, if a bit pat (the fight goes ludicrously well) that Red is the one to defeat both Demis and Taraxon. On the bright side, this means the wedding happens (relatively) smoothly, without needing to worry about anyone’s blessing suddenly turning them evil. Best of all, Ruti allows Red and Rit to get married with not one single incestuous remark! Let’s hope it’s an excellent sign of maturity. Maybe she won’t even go on the honeymoon with them.

The next volume is the last, and honestly, this series has gone on a bit too long. But not to the point where I’m annoyed reading it. This was good.

Agents of the Four Seasons, Vol. 5

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By Kana Akatsuki and Suoh. Released in Japan as “Shunka Shūtō Daikōsha” by Dengeki Bunko. Released in North America by Yen On. Translated by Sergio Avila.

After all the trauma of the first four, I noticed this one was a stand-alone volume, and I hoped that it might be a breather, a chance to relax and perhaps have a more lighthearted plot. And indeed the first half of this book fulfilled my wish. For the most part we have not had to deal with the supernatural person being in love with their minder in this series. Agents tend to love other agents, or other unrelated people. This also applies to the Archer of Twilight. Oh, sure, they are so ridiculously close to their minders that you can see the relationship as homoerotic (see my prior reviews regarding Hinagiku and Sakura), but we haven’t really had a romantic relationship until this book. Kaya is a teenager who is unable to deal with a crush, and her minder, Yuzuru, who clearly loves her deeply but is repressing it. The two of them push against each other, and get grumpy and sad, and it’s adorable. Well, until it isn’t.

Last time we met the Archer of Twilight, Kaguya, whose arrows brought about the night. The Archer of Dawn had a brief, minor appearance, but we get to know her here. After being chosen to be Archer, she was assigned a custodian, but he quickly found that walking up and down a mountain every day for years was too taxing for him. His son, however, Yuzuru, proved only too happy to step in and take care of Kaya. And now she’s in high school. She’s even able to go to an actual school, thanks to concessions from the organization behind all this. She’s a bit worried about Yuzuru, though, who’s so awesome and deserves so much better than staying with her his entire life. Even if she really wants him to, but is too shy to say so. And then there’s a landslide, and everything goes to hell.

While you can rest assured that the bad guys who want to control everyone and everything involved with the seasons and the day/night cycle are still here and still bad, I was rather surprised to find that they weren’t behind the natural disaster that leads off the second half of the book. Sometimes tragic stuff happens and it’s just because of natural causes. That said, the theme of this series is still present and correct. When Kaya makes the decision she does later in the book, she knows that she’s going to be punished for it. Everyone does, in fact, and other people are trying to take the punishment so she doesn’t have to. The best part of the book is when, in the epilogue, Kaya is told her punishment will end soon, she briefly feels it’s not nearly bad enough. Whereupon she’s told “You’re still in high school.” As these books go on, other people are bringing up over and over again what they are doing to children, and pushing back is becoming less a travesty and more a necessity.

We’re back to an arc next time, with more focus on Autumn, who played a major role in this book. Till then, this remains very well-written but also a bit worrying. These poor kids.

An Unruly Summon, Vol. 1

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By Cathfach and Kurodeko. Released in North America by J-Novel Club.

This was one of the winners of the J-Novel Club original light novel contest, where they had judges (including Carlo Zen, author of The Saga of Tanya the Evil) picking out who created the best work. The winners got a cash prize, publication, and illustrations by a Japanese light novel artist (in this case, the Lady Bumpkin and Her Lord Villain artist). The premise of this story interested me, as it looked like it might be a deconstruction of the standard isekai. Which it is, but not as much as you’d expect. Honestly, this has its roots in those old fanfics where the author wrote the story asking “what if everything were the same except the main character was sensible and asked questions?” Thomas, the main character of this story, is sensible and definitely does ask questions, but that only gets him so far, because this is a world that has been at war for a while, and has summoned heroes before, and they are not happy they have to do it again. So they try to rig the game in their favor. This goes badly for almost everyone.

Thomas Smith is walking drunkenly back to his apartment with his friend Simon when he spots a purple “whirlwind” in front of him. On touching it, he ends up in another world. There, he is told that the world is under threat from demons who are on the verge of destroying humanity, and he has the power to help them fight back. He’s also assigned four pretty women – Stephanie, the King’s daughter; Christine, a knight; Wendy, a mage; and Mary, a slave. As he learns about magic and swordplay, and discovers that, much to his surprise, he really does seem to have heroic abilities, he also starts to connect the dots that they’re lying to him. In fact, the reader knows this from the start. Previous heroic summonings haven’t always gone well (and, in a nice meta joke, tend to be Japanese teenagers), so they gave him a “harem” and are trying to get him to be their good little puppet. The more he learns, however, the more everything completely goes off the rails.

This is a solid book, which wants to play around in the isekai sandbox but also try to examine some of its cliches. Slavery is examined closely here, and it’s horrifying in many ways. About 40% of the way into the book, we get a HOLY CRAP moment, and you wonder if that’s going to help solve the slavery thing, but that ends up not really being the case. Because this is a world where no one really understands how magic works. A lot of it is just “because it’s magic”. And Thomas finds that the success and failure of his spells lean a lot on his feelings towards others – even if they’re unconscious. Which means if he is unconsciously blaming others for their past horrible actions, even if he wants to save him the magic can simply not work. The world is also just starting to show off its complexity – it’s clearly meant to be multiple volumes, though I’m not sure how ongoing series work when it’s a contest winner. Possibly depends on sales.

I will admit, the character I most want to see more of in future books is the one who only appeared on the last page. So I would like to see more of this. For fans of isekai who want dark!gray!independent heroes.

Breathless Time Traveler

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By Yuyuko Takemiya and Tsubasa Yamaguchi. Released in Japan as “Anata wa Koko de, Iki ga dekiru no?” by Shincho Bunko nex. Released in North America by Seven Seas. Translated by Alexandra Owen-Burns.

I must admit, in general I tend not too look too closely at Seven Seas’ one-volume light novels that they turn out quite a bit of, mostly as they tend to all look like they’re going to be “bittersweet, possibly tragic love story”. But this one they hooked me in on, because it’s by the author of Toradora!, a series I quite enjoy. Having read it, I found it well-written and compelling, despite the fact that, as I expected, it is exactly the genre that I said above. But that’s not all it is. This falls into the category of one of those books where you’re trying to figure out the plot, and you’re also trying to figure out if the characters are telling us the truth. And oh yes, it’s a time loop story, so we also have to pay attention to which timeline we might be in right now. It’s a bit of a mess. Kind of like our heroine.

We meet our heroine, Rara, dying on the side of the road after a fatal motorcycle accident. She’s able to give us an awful lot of first-person narration, despite an awful lot of grotesque imagery. (Folks bothered by motor vehicle accidents and their aftermath may want to skip this book). Oddly, we also see her sitting at a television, watching as an alien come to Earth announces that the world is going to end soon… and the alien is then killed. The same alien shows up in front of the dying Rara and explains that this world is created by her, and that she is the only one who can save it. She then finds herself back in time, at the point where she meets her lover. The alien is trying to get her to avoid this guy, or break up with him, or otherwise do something different so that she avoids dying in the accident. She, however, keeps doing the exact same thing. After all, she loves him.

So yeah, a little weird. Rara can be a bit dislikable at the start of the book, when she’s a furious teen ranting at (and seeking the approval of) her overly logical and punctilious mother. And as the book went on, I guessed one of the mysteries fairly quickly. But figuring things out is not really the reason to read this. This is a book about the joys of being in love, and that sometimes, when you’re deeply in love, you care about your partner a lot more than yourself. The title comes from Rara’s constant question to Kengo, “can you breathe? Are you breathing?”, which is connected to the fatal accident but also makes a very good metaphor for the stress of everyday life, and how everything can just be far too much. You can’t move forward or accept things. You stop breathing. In the end, Rara is able to get the happy ending she wants, but to do that, she has to accept that this happy ending is not going to involve her. And that’s fine. The one she loves is happy.

This was a bit depressing, out of necessity, but also had some very evocative imagery. I’m glad I read it.

A Late-Start Tamer’s Laid-Back Life, Vol. 13

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By Yuu Tanaka and Nardack. Released in Japan as “Deokure Tamer no Sono Higurashi” by GC Novels. Released in North America by J-Novel Club. Translated by A.M. Cola.

Those readers who dislike the frequently seen characterization of a lead as “seems completely unaware of how good/loved/savvy he really is” will have, I assume, dropped this series after the first volume, since that’s entirely what it runs on. Even those of us who enjoy that sort of thing, though, may find this volume trying. We do get the usual share of Yuto trying various recipes and accidentally inventing something amazing, of course, but the back half of this book is taken up with a genuine raid boss fight, which everyone assumes (except Yuto) that he will take part in, and that everyone assumes (except Yuto) that he and his tamed monsters did the most to help win, and then all the NPCs assume (to Yuto’s shock) that he is their leader and the one who they should give all the cool new quests. He will never stop being astonished by this, and he will never stop immediately forgetting it within five minutes.

The first quarter of the book is mostly Yuto puttering around, figuring out you can get medicinal plants when they’ve been trapped in amber, etc. He then meets up with Akari, one of the front-liners he (and we) have not seen for some time. They’re trying to befriend yokai, which you can’t tame per se but you can summon after befriending them. They also (thanks to Yuto’s really high NPC favorability) find a beastgirl who leads them to a village of beastpeople… and a huge, raid-sized monster, which is blocking the way to the sea village they trade with. Realizing that this is likely the way to open the next level that everyone has been searching for, they quickly gather allies and prepare to fight. Though Yuto also makes sure to do those little wandering things he always does, and as such gets all the good info about defeating it.

There’s minimal Alyssa in this book, but that’s mostly a setup for a gag. When Yuto wants to discuss dyeing and miracle herbs, Alyssa is offline, so he goes to someone else in their group, Maple. (No, not that one.) At first she’s fairly blase about what he’s brought, but when she runs across a major find, she quickly explains that he can only speak to Alyssa about this. Sorry, sacrificial meat shield Quick Cat! Only you can overreact to Yuto’s ridiculousness. I was also amused, though a bit annoyed, at Yuto’s anger at the cute couple that’s making eyes at each other while he and Akari are investigating… especially since he’s walking next to a beautiful girl at the time! Yuto is presumable mid-20s, given he’s an a=office worker, and this series is not doing romance, but his occasional “not gay!” or “damn normies” personality quirks seem out of character compared to the rest of him.

So a fairly decent volume of this series, and it gives people what they want. Unless they want Yuto to gain animal traits, he’s said no to that.

Goodbye, Overtime! This Reincarnated Villainess Is Living for Her New Big Brother, Vol. 5

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By Chidori Hama and Wan Hachipisu. Released in Japan as “Akuyaku Reijō, Brocon ni Job Change Shimasu” by Kadokawa Beans Bunko. Released in North America by J-Novel Heart. Translated by Rymane Tsouria.

There are quite a few villainess books where I would describe the plot as performative, but Goodbye Overtime really leans into that. Ekaterina admits that these are real people that she loves and not just characters in a game, and also admits that she’s likely derailed things so much that the whole “doom” part of the game is not going to happen. But the monster from Book 2 shook her, and she remains panicked that if she takes her eyes away from things for one moment, everything will get back on the rails. I was startled to hear that she even saved one of the minor villainesses from a previous book, getting her a job as a maid (and the villainess is actually doing it well!) because she sees it as an inevitable future for herself. Ekaterina is very bad at seeing herself as others see her, but she’s also bad at confessing why she’s worried. At some point I think she’ll have to admit the reincarnation.

It’s STILL summer vacation, and after all her adventures across the territory last time, Ekaterina is back next to her brother and hosting events at her domain’s castle. The special guest is Mikhail, the Crown Prince, so all the red carpets are being rolled out. Flora is also there, and rumors are flying. Rumors are also flying about Ekaterina herself, and those rumors might be a lot closer to reality than she knows. Let’s face it, Mikhail is in love with her, Flora is in love with her, Vladforen is in love with her… and she’s completely incapable of seeing any of this, something all her love interests already know. She only has eyes for her brother, and he for her. Though thankfully, it’s made a little more clear that this is not romantic or sexual.

In any case, there’s a party, where they reintroduce a traditional dance her grandmother had banned, and a hunting party, where women are allowed to hunt again as her grandmother had banned that. Really, we see more evidence that her grandmother is simply terrible, though we are also rewarded with the idea that her father may have loved her mother more than she thought. We also see her almost enter into a contract with fairies, which underlines what the other nobles are saying – she may be gorgeous, and brilliant, and a pioneer in business, but she is painfully naive, and one of these days someone will get her away from Alexei and bad things are going to happen. (This is the second book in a row where she’s been spirited away from her main, and I suspect Mina is stressing out about this.

If you think this review is short on substance, the book is also pretty light. On the bright side, we’re finally heading back to school next time, and hopefully we can advance the plot. Though, like Bakarina, this is a series that relies very heavily on romance not happening despite everyone mooning over the heroine.

D-Genesis: Three Years after the Dungeons Appeared, Vol. 2

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By KONO Tsuranori and ttl. Released in Japan as “D Genesis: Dungeon ga Dekite 3-nen” by Enterbrain. Released in North America by J-Novel Club. Translated by JCT.

Probably my favorite thing about this series so far is how it’s content to just ignore all the obvious plots that people (and indeed a lot of the cast) expect to happen when there’s a series about dungeon diving and killing lots of monsters. This book does have a lot more dungeon diving than the first book, along with a few moments of peril, but for the most part no one is in danger and no one stresses. There is a lot of political wrangling behind the scenes, which our heroes ignore, with the exception of their liaison with the government, who they basically bring into the team full-time here. There is even a brief action sequence near the end, featuring Keigo literally putting Miyoshi under one arm and leaping out of danger. But that’s irrelevant, as what this book is really about is rambling conversations, nerd analysis, food, and cute puppers. Yes, they’re hellhounds. But they’re cute puppers!

Keigo and Miyoshi need to actually go further into the dungeon than slime level, and that means tricking themselves out with all the bells and whistles. They buy an RV and put metal plating all over it. There are multiple kinds of steel balls for Miyoshi to toss. So they should be pretty safe against most of the harder monsters the dungeon has to offer them. Miyoshi ends up taming found monsters who are basically black death shadows in the form of large dogs the size of her. She adores them. They are also very good at keeping her (and, reluctantly, Keigo) safe from assassins. Because the main reason they’re down there is to get another language comprehension orb, which will upset the balance of power in the world. As a result, almost everyone is watching them like a hawk. Well, Russia is trying to kill them.

Despite trying to avoid the politics, the end of this volume makes it clear that they can’t do that for much longer. Staying quiet and anonymous is very difficult with the information they manage to find out. Not that they won’t stop trying. It turns out the person who’s getting the language orb is a 14-year-old genius girl who will be locked away in the US and made to translate. She’s resigned herself to this, but Keigo emphasizes that she has he power to defy that fate and make her own life. Even though we find out that the dungeon can, if used (and abused) properly, give out infinite gold and infinite food, they are still doing their damndest to make sure no one knows who they are for the most part, and that they can still go to nice places and order really good booze. I hope that keeps up.

As with the first book, the more this fights just going from level to level and killing monsters, the more I enjoy it. For nerds who like to ramble.

The Wrong Way to Use Healing Magic, Vol. 1

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By KUROKATA and KeG. Released in Japan as “Chiyu Mahou no Machigatta Tsukaikata: Senjou wo Kakeru Kaifuku Youin” by MF Books. Released in North America by One Peace Books. Translated by Kristi Fernandez.

Last year I was at Anime NYC, and happened across the One Peace table. I admitted I had not reviewed any of their books, and asked which one they would recommend (not Shield Hero). This was the one they picked, so I picked up a copy. A year later, I’m about to head to Anime NYC again, and I felt, you know, I’d better read this or the conversation at the table’s going to be really awkward. The book did not really win me over from the start. Any time our main character starts a bo0ok by telling us how drab, generic and normal he is, I resist the urge to simply stop reading. As it turns out, though, there’s a few interesting ideas going on with this book, and by the time we’re one day into the fantasy world we know one thing for absolute certain: He is not remotely normal at all. That is a bald-faced lie.

Usato is (groan) An Ordinary High School Student (TM). One rainy day he runs into classmate and resident pretty boy Kazuki and student council president and perfect girl Suzune. Since someone took Usato’s umbrella, they walk with him … and suddenly a magical circle appears under them, and they’re summoned to another world to be heroes! Well, Kazuki and Suzune are summoned to be heroes. Usato was accidental. Kazuki has rare light magic! Suzune has powerful lightning magic! They decide to test Usato as well, because why not, and find… he has HEALING magic? Suddenly everyone in the throne room is terrified, and we soon find out why: Usato is abducted by an incredibly strong woman named Rose, who announces she’s going to be training him to be a healer! Of course, Rose’s training puts spartans to shame. What the heck is going on here?

This book knows exactly what genre it’s contrasting itself with. The king and his ministers are horrified and apologetic when Usato is accidentally summoned, and his isekai power turns out to be incredibly valuable. It’s the opposite of all those “useless power and thrown out of the castle with no money” books. Rose’s reason for the spartan training comes up near the end of the book, and it works psychologically. As does Usato’s dogged determination, as he finally gets a great opportunity to not just be some nebbish high school student. Best of all is Suzune, who turns out, once summoned, to be a massive otaku who had to hide it from everyone as she was a rich ojou-sama. Here she gets to live out her isekai fantasies, fire off cool final attacks with her lightning bolts, and flirt with the guy she likes. The last of these does not go well, alas, as Usato has Protagonist Syndrome, so thinks she’s kidding.

So I’m not incredibly sad I missed this when it came out – it is a very common genre, and I try not to read the standard ones unless they have a weird thing going on – but it was pleasant enough, and if I get a gap in my schedule I may read more. For isekai fans.

The Executioner and Her Way of Life: Wish Upon a Star, Pray to a Flower

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By Mato Sato and nilitsu. Released in Japan as “Shokei Shoujo no Virgin Road” by GA Bunko. Released in North America by Yen On. Translated by Jenny McKeon.

Well, back to reality. After a volume where I actually managed to enjoy it from beginning to end, we’re back to business as usual for The Executioner and Her Way of Life. The first 40% or so of this book is absolutely dire, and I was once again wondering why I had not dropped the series. The difficulty is that most of the people who remain in the cast are profoundly unlikable and selfish, and it’s not fun to read about them. This is also a book whose plot synopsis can best be summed up as “everyone is ignoring everyone else’s feelings and desires for the sake of their own”. Now, frequently this is understandable. The color soldiers are looking for a new homeland, and worry that this will cause the humans to try to eradicate them. (Correctly.) And Menou’s grand plan for saving Akari amounts to “kill myself”, so it’s not surprising that Momo is not down with that. Everyone is, frankly, at the end of their tether, and it shows.

Menou, Maya, and Sahara have fled to the Mechanical Society with Abbie’s help, but Michele, Momo and Hooseyard are hot on their trail, and trying to work out a way to break in there. Menou’s goal is the Starseed, but things prove more complicated than expected when they discover that another one of the Four Evils, Gadou, is still alive. After dealing with the fact that Gadou has literal split personalities, Menou puts her plan into action, despite the fact that her memory has gotten so bad that she’s forgotten Flare, Momo, and everything else about her past. Momo, meanwhile, has an Akari-in-a-Box, and a plan to get Menou and Akari both back with their memories attached, but this plan sort of relies on killing Menou first. Just for a bit. A little killing.

This book really does get good in the second half, as everyone starts to fight for their lives and their goals, and realize that there’s no way that everyone can end this alive. Indeed, Menou’s self-hatred and death wish is about all that’s fueling her now, and it helps the reader to sympathize with Momo a great deal, even when she tries to solve a problem by taking Akari from her luggage and hurling her at Menou’s head. Momo and Akari still hate each other, for obvious reasons. That said, Momo’s plan wouldn’t have worked without Akari, so they can at least be grateful for that. By the end of this book, most of the cast are almost back to normal and we’re at the end of the arc. If only Ashuna were back in the series I’d be perfectly happy. (Monkey’s Paw twitches) Oh no…

So yeah, Ashuna is the cliffhanger, and I am no longer happy. I suspect in this world that runs on war, death, and genocide, a lot of other people aren’t going to be happy either. Still, at least with Menou and Akari back to normal, there’s potential for more yuri in Book 10. Recommended, but be prepared for the traditional slow start. Also, warning, this book contains Hooseyard, and she’s still really annoying.

Bofuri: I Don’t Want to Get Hurt, So I’ll Max Out My Defense, Vol. 16

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By Yuumikan and KOIN. Released in Japan as “Itai no wa Iya nano de Bōgyoryoku ni Kyokufuri Shitai to Omoimasu” by Kadokawa Books. Released in North America by Yen On. Translated by Andrew Cunningham.

Bofuri is, in the end, a series about what goes on inside a VRMMO, and most readers are here to follow the fun antics of Maple and Sally. Now, there are real players involved here, Kaede and Risa, and we have seen them on occasion. But we rarely have a chance to be in their heads for more than a couple of pages before we’re back in the gaming world seeing Maple eat a giant lump of poison. The series began with a brief mention that Risa had tried to get Kaede into some other games, but nothing clicked till New World Online. This volume, however, very definitely says the end is near. And as a result, we’re getting a little (very little) background into Kaede and Risa. Which is good! But given it’s the real world, we may actually get some real-life drama in Bofuri, the anti-consequences series. As frankly, Risa is starting to get very desperate about gaming with Kaede as much as possible before it’s too late.

Last time I said there would be an after-event recap of some sort, but nope. We’re straight into more gaming, as everyone goes around clearing dungeons, battling new monsters, and preparing for the 10th stratum. When that’s finally revealed, it’s shown to be the previous nine floors all in one – each section is one of the prior floors. The goal here is to Kill The Demon Lord, so Maple and Sally and the rest of Maple Tree start investigating to figure out how to do that. And they want to do it fast, as Maple and Sally have made things clear at last: they’re going to be third-year high school students soon, which means the days of gaming for hours a day are gone forever. It’s time to start getting serious about college.

It’s been clear from a while ago, and is made more explicit here, that Sally wants to fight Maple in a PvP battle, but holds off as she knows Maple doesn’t enjoy those. Maple is aware of this, though, and as their deadline draws near she’s starting to dwell on it more. She has no trouble fighting (and destroying) Frederica, mind you, but Sally is different. Back in the real world, not only is Risa anxious about those halcyon days with Kaede ending forever, but there’s also implications about Kaede’s past. We’d guessed that they’d been friends since they were kids, which is mentioned here without any detail. But now we hear how much Maple has changed since starting New World Online, and that she had never been so excited or enjoyed herself so much before. I want to know more about this! What was pre-Bofuri Kaede like? Was she bullied? Was she introverted? What’s going on here? And is there anything besides her latent crush and possibly different colleges that is the reason Risa is so desperate to enjoy this time with Kaede while she can?

There’s so much story I want to know about, and we get more of it here than most other volumes. But there’s still very little of it. Trust me, if you want to see Maple create poison copies of herself that explode, you’re also in the right place. Next time, probably more grinding and investigation.

Engaging with the Plot: A Former Cat’s Attempt to Save Her Now Temporary Fiancé, Vol. 1

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By Usagi Hoshimi and Qi234. Released in Japan as “Konyakusha-sama ni wa Unmei no Heroine ga Arawaremasu ga, Zantei Konyaku Life wo Mankitsushimasu! Anata no Noroi, Kiraware Akujo no Watashi ga Toicha Dame desu ka?” by Earth Star Luna. Released in North America by J-Novel Heart. Translated by Minna Lin.

It’s always dangerous when you’re making stew. When you have something that’s just “let’s throw as many common ingredients into the pot as we can, stir it up, and eat that for supper”. A lot of the time it just ends up being an ugly, overcomplicated mess. Sometimes, though, all the ingredients manage to coalesce into something really tasty. You wouldn’t dare call it original – the exact opposite – but the common muck ends up being just what you wanted. We get that here. This is a villainess story with a capital V, having all the trimmings, and yet it works because it doesn’t take itself remotely seriously (at times I wondered if it was actually trying to be a parody) and because it has a really good story to tell about love, and what happens to people who get it and people who don’t.

Stop me if you’ve heard this one before, but we open the book with our main character being dumped publicly by her fiance, the second prince. Lucille was well-meaning and did her princess lessons well, but she knew the princess didn’t love her and was trying much too hard to change that. Now she’s engaged to the “cursed marquess”. Felix. This causes her to pass out… and when she wakes up she has memories of her past… eight lives. Yes, this is her ninth life, but her first as a human. In the previous eight, she was a beloved pet cat of some of the most influential and powerful people in history. And what’s more, she has a prophecy, which shows her pissing off Felix, getting into dark magic, and being killed by the Saint who’ll be arriving in a year. Fortunately, with her past memories and her premonitions, she can change literally everything about this plot.

A lot of this just made me laugh. It’s always nice to see an isekai’d Japanese girl who’s part of the supporting cast rather than the lead – one of Lucille’s past owners was a reincarnator who loved her “smol” kitty. The second prince is a buffoon who cannot recognize that the beautiful woman in front of him is his ex-fiancee, just not wearing heavy makeup, and it just gets sillier and sillier as he rants. But there’s also some really good stuff here. Lucille, being an ex-cat, does not remotely worry about what anyone thinks of her and is very confident. And she’s surrounded by people who are filled with self-loathing or self-doubt, ranging from the cursed Marquess to her new friend Mary Hunt… erm, Alice Rohans, who suffers from being the normal one in a generation of geniuses, to her own father, who is caring but it comes out as uncaring. If there’s a weakness, it’s that the dialogue can seem a bit TOO overly elaborate. Sometimes these people speak as if they’re reading words off a page rather than being in the moment.

This has a second volume coming, which I assume will resolve the curse as well as the cliffhanger we saw. If you liked Lady Bumpkin, and you liked Bakarina, and wondered what would happen if you smashed them together, this is that book.

Lacey Longs for Freedom: The Dawn Witch’s Low-Key Life after Defeating the Demon King, Vol. 3

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By Hyogo Amagasa and Kyouichi. Released in Japan as “Akatsuki no Majo Lacey wa Jiyū ni Ikitai” by Overlap Novels f. Released in North America by J-Novel Heart. Translated by Amanogawa Tenri.

This one snuck up on me. I was sort of gently mocking the book as I went through the first half, which is very much on the “low-key life” part of the title. Lacey invents oven mitts. Lacey invents a camera. But then it turns out that all of this, as well as the previous two books, are important as Lacey is asked to come back to the capital. And, while there’s a lot of backsliding and introverted panicking, the difference between the Lacey of the start of the first book and the one we see in this volume is night and day. She’s an incredibly powerful witch, and everyone and their brother want to use her. But while she does want to bring the kingdom happiness, she also wants the privilege of choosing how she is used. And people are taking notice. Best of all, Lacey finally cottons on to what her feelings for Wayne actually are. She’s not quite ready to do anything yet, but the feelings are recognized.

Wayne shows up at the village again, and this time he’s here for a full month, though he doesn’t say why. We see Lacey helping Cedric, who turns out to have a daughter who is getting married, and he wants to bake something special for the wedding but can’t figure out what. After the wedding, discussion of how the kids are having trouble remembering what the dress looked like makes Lacey want to create photography, which she does through a wonderful series of trial and error and the help of her phoenix. Finally, though, Wayne reveals why he’s there. The princess (you know, the one who cheated with Lacey’s fiancee in Book 1) is getting married, but has locked herself in her room right before the wedding. The king is asking Lacey to help do something about that. But why is the princess there in the first place?

After getting a fairly typical “evil noble” in the last book, the most refreshing part of this one is seeing how it handles the prior antagonists. The King is mindboggled by how much Lacey has changed from just a year away from saving the world and being the Dawn Witch. Alicia, the princess, already fully regrets her philandering, but being married off to a foreign prince (who’s fine, at least) has her lonely and homesick before she even leaves. Heck, we even get a side story showing that Raymond, whose fault all of this really is, has gotten used to life on the farm where he’s been exiled too, and is even coming through with delicious vegetables. If there’s a weak spot in the series, it continues to be Wayne, who I sort of but not really wish would be found to have a dark side, or a secret he hasn’t revealed. He’s just this bland guy.

But we’re not here for him, we’re here for Lacey, and she’s fun. She also reminds me of Monica, so Silent Witch fans should also get this. The next volume, which should wrap the series up, is not out in Japan yet.