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Reviews

I Shall Survive Using Potions!, Vol. 8

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By FUNA and Sukima. Released in Japan as “Potion-danomi de Ikinobimasu!” by K Lanove Books. Released in North America by J-Novel Club. Translated by Hiroya Watanabe.

Been a while, hasn’t it? There was about an 18-month gap between books 7 and 8 in Japan, and that’s about what we got here as well. The reason for that, of course, is that the author does about eight different things at once. There are still new volumes of Didn’t I Say to Make My Abilities Average coming out every 3-4 months, and Saving 80,000 Gold in Another World for My Retirement has also reached its 8th book. Plus there’s been the saving 80K Gold anime, which is currently running and seems to have offended fans of the books far less than the MMAA anime did. In fact, the one thing that we haven’t seen yet is a big crossover between the three series. We are, sadly, unlikely to see it either, as Mile and friends are Square Enix people, while Mitsuha and Kaoru are Kodansha. Still, there’s a way around this. If you can’t have the three series cross over directly, just have the Potion cast cosplay as the other two series!

Now that all three of the KKR team are reincarnated and together again, it’s time to advance Kaoru’s very vague plan, which mostly involves expanding her business while also having the three of them makes names for themselves (in disguise). Reiko will go to an adventurer’s guild and show off her amazing coin cutting skills (or at least cheat her way through), which may sound very similar to Mavis in Make My Abilities Average!. Kyoko will go to a nearby city and start her own business, selling useful items and having everyone think she’s a noble’s daughter in a way that is clearly nothing like the protagonist of Saving 80K Gold at all. As for Kaoru, she’s trying to get her alter ego to be thought of as a saint, which mostly involves going around healing people and being very humble about it. That said, she’s trying to do a better job about this than she did the first time around.

This book can get very meta – Kaoru explicitly calls the first six volumes (before she was “killed”) Season One here, though I’d argue that Potion Girl 7-8 are more a soft reboot than anything else. The joke throughout the book is that each of the three girls sees themselves as the sensible one trying to hold back the impetuous madness of the others, but they’re all exactly the same deep down. This shows itself best with Kaoru, who, after setting Kyoko up with a nice quiet business and telling her NOT to go on a rampage, goes on her own rampage when she discovers that one business she was working with is using a family power struggle to replace everyone and take over Kaoru’s business. Naturally, this calls for revenge. But not the sort of revenge that the other girls would do. Different, more genteel revenge. (That said, having seen Kaoru go off in previous books, this is very mild by her standards.)

The ninth volume is due out in Japan this month, so we should not have as long a wait till the next book. Till then, enjoy the most hardcore FUNA series, where anything can happen.

Death’s Daughter and the Ebony Blade, Vol. 3

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By Maito Ayamine and Cierra. Released in Japan as “Shinigami ni Sodaterareta Shoujo wa Shikkoku no Tsurugi wo Mune ni Idaku” by Overlap Bunko. Released in North America by J-Novel Club. Translated by Sylvia Gallagher.

I have to feel bad for the normal soldiers in this book, whose job it appears to be to get massacred, either by the antagonists or by Olivia, who is technically the protagonist but whose body count is mind-numbing. We see an entire fortress of Crimson Knights slaughtered, not as part of a military ex4ercize or in a political maneuver, but merely to show off how dangerous and powerful the new group of bad guys are. Hell, we even get a “you have a wife and twin daughters, and another on the way” comment to the guy in charge, though honestly by the time he was brutally murdered I’d forgotten about his family, who we’re never going to meet. Only the strong survive in this series, and the definition of strong gets higher all the time. The possible exception to this is Ashton, but it’s his strategy that’s monstrous in this case, so he’s entitled to have the other monsters guard him.

Olivia, Ashton and Claudia have finally gotten permission to research the name Olivia took on as her own, and why its origins and downfall are essentially missing. Sadly, they don’t have much time to do this before they’re ordered to go help the 2nd Legion, who are in a desperate battle where even having a crafty and clever commander is not helping them. Fortunately, Ashton has a plan. Also fortunately, after the war gets worse and worse, the 1st Legion finally gets the OK to leave guarding the king and go into battle – and, for once, they actually show off why they’re the first legion, as their commander is the bigger fish in the “there’s always a bigger fish” anecdote. Now that the day has been saved once again, there’s only one question remaining: how big a cake can the royal palace make for Olivia?

First of all, I would like to beg the author: please have just one “male commander and female adjutant” pairing where she’s not obviously in love with him, I beg you. Though obviously this does not apply to the rather unbalanced triangle between Olivia, Claudia and Ashton, that’s still hilarious. Secondly, most of this book is meant to show us that there’s a third side to this war, they’re the equivalent of “the Church”, and they tend towards the evil, as most Church groups do in fantasy books like this one. I was pleased to see that the Church’s resident lothario makes absolutely no headway with either of our female leads – Claudia because she can see through his bullshit, and Olivia because normal human behavior is not a thing she does. That said, the bigger danger shows up at the end of the book, and I suspect it may be that which Olivia deals with in the next volume.

Aside from the three leads, this is not a series where I recommend getting too attached to anyone in the cast. But if you don’t mind some darkness, this is a fun ride with a very odd heroine.

The Mythical Hero’s Otherworld Chronicles, Vol. 2

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By Tatematsuri and Ruria Miyuki. Released in Japan as “Shinwa Densetsu no Eiyū Isekai Tan” by Overlap Bunko. Released in North America by J-Novel Club. Translated by James Whittaker.

This book takes its isekai and fantasy world tropes seriously. That is its best feature, but also one of its major flaws. It’s refreshing to read a straightforward military fantasy book – as I’ve noted, there’s a lot of Altina the Sword Princess in this, but it feels even more serious than that series did – and Hiro, now with his memories returned, makes a clever and overpowered protagonist who nevertheless does not need to worry about MP expense as he plans his next moves. The flaw is that this also does not really take into account the subversions that we English-speaking readers would really prefer that it did. There are slaves in this book, who are abused, conscripted, and massacred, and they are there to be mooks and nothing more. Only one of them has a name, and she turns out to be the daughter of a village chief. As for discussion of whether slavery is bad, it’s left to a “demon” character to free her. Not happy with that.

After the events of the previous book, Regis… erm, sorry, Hiro… is called to the capital, there to prove the rumors about his lineage and to get a reward. Of course, what this means in reality is that he’s now embroiled in royal politics, and all the nobles are looking at him as if he has a “50% off” sign around his neck. Fortunately, Hiro proves to be very good at judging people’s true intentions… though that doesn’t mean that he still can’t be dragged along as part of someone else’s plan, especially when they’re related to a certain red-haired princess. After this, there’s still a battle to be fought and won, and Hiro gets to prove that he’s just as able as a military tactician as he is at political maneuvering. All that said, the addition of a zlosta warrior to the enemy ranks will prove more difficult.

The cover art of the first three books very much shows this is going to be a “new girl every volume” sort of series, and indeed Liz sits out most of the first half of this book. Instead we get Hiro bonding with Aura, which I honestly preferred, mostly as they vibe with each other straight away – he even alludes to his actual identity in such a way that she can’t help but understand. We also get Rosa introduced to us, who I hope is there to show that, after the events of Book One, this will not have Hiro’s Sexual Adventures as part of the plotline – I was relieved that he rejected her incredibly forward advances. (Going to a noble party dressed in the gown we see Rosa wearing in the color pages raised both my eyebrows.) As for the rest of the book, it’s military strategy, so as usual, I have little to say.

This remains a very readable book, which is probably its best feature. If you enjoy military fantasy and royal succession drama, and don’t mind a new girl in every port, this is a series to enjoy.

Though I Am an Inept Villainess: Tale of the Butterfly-Rat Body Swap in the Maiden Court, Vol. 3

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By Satsuki Nakamura and Kana Yuki. Released in Japan as “Futsutsuka na Akujo dewa Gozaimasu ga: Suuguu Chouso Torikae Den” by Ichijinsha Novels. Released in North America by Airship. Translated by Tara Quinn.

In my review of the first volume, I simply didn’t like her, so didn’t talk much about Keigetsu. In the second review I liked her far more, but Reirin basically bulldozed my talking about anything else. But now it’s finally time for me to talk about Keigetsu, now that she’s finally getting a separate plotline of her own. To be fair, the book holds the reader’s hand near the end in case they missed it, pointing out that for all that Keigetsu spends her time whining, complaining, and fretting, she doesn’t run away from anything for more than a few minutes. More importantly for her future in the Court, though, Reirin notices that the amount of magical talent she has to not only bodyswap them without any complications, but do also potentially bodyswap, say, just a hand or an eye, means she has probably more power than anyone else around. She’ll need it, because there’s a new villainess in town, and I don’t mean Reirin.

Reirin and Keigetsu have bodyswapped a few minor times since the end of the second book, and nothing seems to have come of it. But things are a bit too dangerous now for any swapping to take place: the Harvest Festival will be held in the Shu lands, with Keigetsu in charge of hospitality ad also a performance to the Gods. Which is a problem being that everyone in the Shu palace is quitting. Things get worse when you go to the Shu lands themselves – a group of villagers are being riled up to kidnap and torture Keigetsu, in hopes that, because rumor has it her terribleness is the reason for recent bad weather, her murder will mean everything will improve again. All this stress, unfortunately, combined with a double dose of bullying, means Reirin and Keigetsu do bodyswap at the worst possible time. Now Reirin has to fight for her life.

This third book may also run on “who’s in what body?”, but everything has changed now that folks are aware of the possibility – in fact, it leads to many of the funniest moments in the book, as Reirin thinks that her impersonation of Keigetsu is perfect, when in fact it’s utter garbage. She also has stronger allies this time, as one of her brothers comes along for the kidnapping ride, and the Captain of the Eagle Eyes also shows up relatively quickly. Unfortunately, this is not just a matter of Reirin winning over her enemies by “doing it with a bang” – someone really wants the Shu destroyed, and they’re using people who are using other people who are using other people to do it. The cliffhanger is a double one, but for once the threat of half the cast dying of the plague is not as chilling as realizing who the new bad girl in town is.

The author again apologizes for this needing to run to two books to complete the arc. Honestly, I’m glad – this book is already very long, any longer and we’d be getting into Horizon in the Middle of Nowhere territory. Till then, please enjoy Reirin learning what it feels like to live, and Keigetsu learning what one must do to survive. Or vice versa.

Random Reads 2/17/23

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Bellfield Hall by Anna Dean
The year is 1805. Dido Kent, unmarried aunt, is summoned to Bellfield Hall by her niece, Catherine, to look into the disappearance of Catherine’s wealthy betrothed, Richard Montague. Soon after her arrival, a woman turns up dead in the shrubbery. Dido makes inquiries into both matters while getting to know the residents and her fellow visitors.

There’s a quote from Anne Perry on the cover that says, “Characters one cares about immediately and a mystery that becomes more urgent with every page.” I regret to say this claim is false, at least in my personal experience, because this book took me nearly 2.5 years to finish. One of my major obstacles was that it took a very long time for the bevy of houseguests to resolve into distinct characters. For example, it was not until the 60% mark that three young women (including Catherine) display a personality characteristic beyond “flighty.”

Thankfully, the book does improve quite a lot after this point, with Dido helping two of the ladies avoid unwanted marriage proposals, and all the various clues coming together in a satisfying solution that I had not predicted. I also appreciated Dido’s naivete in certain areas. At one point, one of the guests, Colonel Walborough, confides that he stands to inherit his uncle’s fortune only if he gets married. He is simultaneously harassing a handsome young footman. Dido assumes he’s a womanizer because “she could think of no other irregularity in a man’s life for which marriage might be considered a cure.”

Despite the slog, I did like this well enough in the end that I will probably proceed to the next in the series. Let’s hope it does not take another 2.5 years to finish.

The Bullet That Missed by Richard Osman
In The Bullet That Missed, the Thursday Murder Club is investigating the murder of Bethany Waites, a TV journalist whose car was found at the bottom of a cliff after she’d made a breakthrough in her investigation into a VAT fraud scheme. This brings them into the orbit of Mike Waghorn, Bethany’s former co-anchor, who loved Bethany because she helped him accept himself as a gay man, and Pauline Jenkins, Mike’s make-up artist, who soon becomes a new love interest for Ron. As a subplot, Elizabeth and Stephen are kidnapped by “the Viking,” who instructs Elizabeth to kill her old friend and former KGB agent, Viktor Illyich, or the Viking will kill Joyce.

There was much to like in this latest installment! Often with mysteries I have an inkling as to who the culprit is just by virtue of their function in the narrative, but this time I had no idea. I think that’s probably because Osman has a track record of introducing people doing crime and promptly turning them into recurring characters with insecurities and foibles. Connie Johnson, for example, returns here to help Ibrahim investigate a fellow inmate, one of the participants in the VAT fraud, while also receiving therapy from him that forces her to question whether she’s really all bad like she’s convinced herself. And when Ron questions Jack Mason, another VAT fraud participant, the latter is mostly just grateful to have someone to play snooker with again because he’s gotten old and lonely.

I continue to be charmed by the core gang of four. I think fussy and meticulous Ibrahim is probably my favorite, but Joyce’s diary entries make me laugh the most. The continuing mental deterioration of Stephen is deeply sad, but I love that glimmers of his brilliance still remain and that he was able to discover the Viking’s identity when not even Elizabeth had managed to do so. Really, my one quibble is that a new character is introduced to Coopers Chase, loves it, considers moving there and then, at the end of the book, doesn’t. Why not?

The unabridged audiobook I listened to concluded with an interview with Richard Osman in which he stated his intention to continue producing one of these books each year. Sir, thank you for your service. I am so here for it.

Double Tragedy by Freeman Wills Crofts
This is the 24th mystery by Freeman Wills Crofts to feature Chief Inspector Joseph French of Scotland Yard, and while I ordinarily very much dislike reading a series out of order, this is one of those times where that doesn’t really matter.

Originally published in the UK as The Affair in Little Wokeham (and soon receiving a reprint under that title), Double Tragedy begins by painting the portrait of a new family who has moved to the tiny village of Little Wokeham in Surrey and of the mild-mannered doctor who gets swept up in their affairs. Dr. Anthony Mallaby once had grand ambitions but an untimely illness thwarted his plans and though his village practice is successful enough, he still considers himself a failure. When he meets Christina Winnington, one of the new occupants of Hurst Lodge, he’s instantly taken by her honesty and kindness and falls in love over a period of months.

Hurst Lodge has actually been purchased by Christina’s uncle Clarence Winnington, a rich yet domineering man given to hurtful sarcasm, who has promised his nieces and nephew (Christina has two siblings, Bellisa and Bernard) each one-third of his estate if Christina and Bernard will keep house for him until he passes away. (Bellisa has married her former boss, saturnine Guy Plant.) Obviously, someone cannot wait for that to happen naturally, so the old fellow gets done in. Before French is called in to investigate, Dr. Mallaby, seeking to protect Christina’s happiness as much as possible, discovers and withholds evidence (a fountain pen, to my delight!) that he believes proves Bernard’s guilt.

This title is an inverted mystery, which means readers know the culprit from the outset and it’s just a matter of time while French puts the clues together. I liked a lot of the characters in this book and enjoyed reading chapters from various points of view. The ending is also very satisfying. However, if there’s one weakness in the narrative it’s in how the reader almost receives too much information. We are told practically everything about how the murderer commits his crimes, to the point where when one small piece is overlooked (the disposal of several specific incriminating items is mentioned but what about the other one?) one wonders if it’s supposed to be significant or not. Similarly, we go through every step of French’s thoughts where he leans one way then decides he is wrong over and over. I still really liked it and intend to read more by Crofts but now I understand why an adjective that seems to crop up a lot regarding this series is “plodding.”

Ladies with a Unicorn by Monica Stirling
I’m a big fan of the book blog Furrowed Middlebrow and have been enjoying Scott’s progress through the novels of Monica Stirling. When he declared that Ladies with a Unicorn is now his favorite of the lot, I had to track it down.

The setting is Rome in the early 1950s. Françoise Joubert is a composer who is presently working on a new film by Italian director Count Anton-Giulio Sarmento. She’s a withdrawn person—she both lost her husband (a resistance fighter arrested, tortured, and killed by the Germans) and sustained terrible facial injuries during the war—but is pulled into new social circles when a former classmate, Peggy Latour, unexpectedly arrives in Rome and requests they meet up. Later, Françoise meets 18-year-old Anna-Maria Minsell, who has flown in from London to star in Anton-Giulio’s film, and Princess Valeria Girafalcone, Anton-Giulio’s effusive cousin.

About two-thirds of the way through this I realized there actually isn’t much of a plot at all, but the novel remains fascinating despite that. It’s all about the female characters and, ultimately, their feelings for Anton-Giulio. Françoise has turned her face (expressionless and disconcerting after multiple surgeries) from the present and dwells in the sorrows of the past; Peggy is bored, her exciting war-time marriage turned bland; Anna-Maria is both sensible and sensitive; and Valeria is impassioned, theatrical, and maddening. Anton-Giulio is the unicorn of the title, often discussed but seldom appearing, like some mythical creature, and everyone has their own idea of the kind of person he is.

I enjoyed Stirling’s writing style very much. There were many turns of phrase to admire and absurd details to be delighted by—I hope I never forget the description of the stationery Valeria commissioned for one of her pet projects—mingled with reminders of terrible things that happened during the war. Anna-Maria is much affected by visiting the site of a particular atrocity and then returning to the city, where everyone is just going about their lives as usual. I had expected the novel to end in a more conventional way than it ultimately did, and I’m glad Stirling went in another direction because it really reinforced the idea that you can’t let the past continue to make you miserable forever. At some point, you’ve got to decide to keep living.

I’m very glad I read this and hope to read more by Stirling someday.

A Lady’s Guide to Etiquette and Murder by Dianne Freeman
There are literally dozens of cozy historical mystery series featuring a plucky female sleuth, often a young widow, and for whatever reason they always appeal to me. (If I’m honest, part of the reason I was tempted by A Lady’s Guide to Etiquette and Murder is that the cover is so cute.) I figured I’d start sampling them in hopes I’d find something I really like.

It’s April 1899 and American-born Frances Wynn, widowed Countess of Harleigh, has just endured the requisite one-year period of mourning after the death of her philandering husband, Reggie. Frances can no longer tolerate living with her husband’s family and obtains a house of her own in Belgravia. Her in-laws aren’t happy about this, as they had counted on using her money to fund repairs to Harleigh Manor. Frances relishes her newfound independence though is taken aback to discover that her new neighbor is George Hazelton, one of two people who knows that Reggie actually died in the bed of another woman.

Complications soon ensue. Inspector Delaney from the Metropolitan Police comes calling to ask questions about Reggie’s death, Frances’ brother-in-law files a claim to gain control of her money, and Frances’ mother sends her younger sister over from America with the expectation that Frances will find her a suitable husband. Also, there’s a jewel thief and George keeps being both helpful and hawt.

Dual mysteries run throughout—was Reggie actually murdered and who is the jewel thief? The first is solved in a thoroughly anticlimactic way with a sudden confession, though the latter does require at least a little investigative effort on Frances’ part. Unfortunately, one line of dialogue about 30% through gave away a large part of the solution for me. Too, I was bothered enough by seeming anachronisms to go into research mode several times. For most of these, I determined that the usage was at least potentially fine, but using the term “stalking” to refer to following someone in a menacing way is definitely more modern than 1899.

I wouldn’t say that this book is great, but I did find it entertaining. It’s a nice piece of fluff, and sometimes I appreciate that. I liked Frances and George and am interested enough that I shall proceed on to book two at some point.

Murder by Inches by Stanley Hopkins Jr.
I first became aware of this obscure title from 1943 through the delightful book blog crossexaminingcrime. A mystery in which cats figure prominently seemed like my sort of thing and, without much hope, I submitted an interlibrary loan request. To my surprise, a copy was found!

Murder by Inches is narrated by Angela Thorpe, a recent college graduate who is biding her time at home (Cheswick, NY) during the summer while she waits to start a teaching position in September. Her plans involve nothing more than reading Lucretius and Virgil and tutoring a local teen. Instead, when the owner of the local newspaper turns up dead and a charming newcomer, Peter Marrell, asks for her help after the police chalk it up to suicide, she gets roped into the investigation. The mystery itself is, alas, not terribly interesting, involving German efforts to sabotage a shipyard and hinder the American war effort, though it does allow for some fun escapades which frequently run toward breaking and entering. Also, there was a weird moment where the sleuths discuss in front of the shipyard owner that his wife had been seduced and blackmailed and he has zero reaction to this information.

However, I still enjoyed the book very much, which is due to the writing style and the prickly heroine. Angela is a scholar and mostly just wants to be left alone. Early on in the book, her attempts to read outdoors are repeatedly thwarted by Evelyn, the little girl who lives next door. Angela’s interactions with the girl reminded me a lot of a story in Allie Brosh’s Solutions and Other Problems.

(Click to enlarge.)

There are some great descriptions of side characters—“as unnoticeable as an apostrophe and made of the same general shape” and “a tall, angular woman who looks and moves like a poorly adjusted marionette”—and I also appreciated that Angela expresses frustration with being expected to follow Peter around while he looks for clues.

”I want to help, but I don’t want to have to trot about after you merely as a sort of observer. My time is as valuable as anyone’s, and I’m going home to get some work done. Let me know if I can really be of some use.”

Peter, infuriatingly, reacts as though this is funny. I never did warm to Peter, in fact, and though there is evidently a second book featuring his detection efforts, I am loathe to read it unless it’s also narrated by Angela. I am, however, very glad to have read this one!

My Own Worst Frenemy by Kimberly Reid
This series has been on my to-read list for a long time. A Black teen girl detective? Yes, please!

Chanti Evans is the daughter of an undercover cop. Though she and her single mom (Lana) live in a Denver neighborhood where admiration for the police is decidedly uncommon, Chanti still thinks it’s a cool job and prides herself on the detective skills that she’s learned from Lana. When Chanti makes a bad decision over the summer (involving her new friend, MJ, who previously spent some time in juvenile detention) Lana strives to keep her out of trouble by enrolling her at ritzy Langdon Prep rather than the regular high school the rest of her friends are attending. Unfortunately, Chanti and the other “scholarship kids” (including hunky love interest Marco Ruiz) are soon blamed for a series of thefts on campus and, later, some home burglaries.

There were good and bad things about this book, though the good does outweigh the bad. To begin with some negatives, we are told multiple times that Chanti notices everything. How, then, has she failed to notice that people usually require a writing implement while attending school? How then, did she immediately plow over some dude’s birdbath when tooling around in her friend’s BMW? It felt like her character was sacrificed to move the plot along. Another weird contradiction occurs when, on page 120, she tells her friend Tasha about the accusations at Langdon and requests Tasha not tell her mother. On page 124, Chanti volunteers all this information to her mother herself without an explicit change of heart. Perhaps another editorial pass might’ve caught and dealt with these contradictions.

That said, I quite liked how much Chanti seeks out Lana’s help with her investigation; it evoked some Keith/Veronica Mars feels. While some of the dialogue is clunky, several lines of Chanti’s internal monologue made me laugh, like when she refers to Tasha as “the weave whisperer” or, after committing the cardinal sin of letting Marco know she is hungry, tries to “think of something else I can do to let him know I’m a delicate flower.” Lastly, while it’s fairly easy to figure out some of the solution to the thefts and burglaries, there were aspects that I hadn’t been able to predict.

I also read the prequel short story “Looking for Trouble,” which rehashes and fleshes out Chanti’s aforementioned bad decision over the summer before she started at Langdon Prep. I didn’t like how it retconned a couple of things established in My Own Worst Frenemy, turning MJ from an inadvertent accessory to crime to an active participant in crime and having Chanti encounter Marco a couple of times at her summer job instead of meeting him for the first time on the first day of school. The additional detail on her neighborhood, though, was great and gave me a much better sense of Aurora Avenue and the people who live there.

A Night in the Lonesome October by Robert Zelazny
I was convinced to read this by an article on io9 and joined in on the fan ritual of reading one chapter per day throughout the month of October.

A Night in the Lonesome October is narrated by Snuff, a dog who is something more than just a dog. Snuff provides invaluable aid to his master, Jack, who is tasked with procuring various ingredients for a ritual happening at the end of the month known as “the Game.” (We are to presume he is Jack the Ripper, as he has both a wicked knife and a bloodlust curse, though perhaps they are one and the same.) Over the course of daily chapters we’re introduced to the other players in the Game and their animal companions, and eventually learn about the opposing factions and their goals. Characters like Dracula, Frankenstein, The Wolf Man, and Sherlock Holmes figure prominently. However, the standout character for me was Graymalk, cat companion to a witch named Jill.

Although I started off enjoying the amusing writing a good deal, around the middle I started to get bored. One of Snuff’s jobs is to triangulate the location of the ritual based on the residences of the participants, and he does this over and over as he receives new information. It grew monotonous. The real nadir, though, comes during an eye-glazingly dull excursion across a Lovecraftian dreamscape. After that, thankfully, things start to pick up again and I was genuinely invested until the conclusion, where several threads tie together in a satisfying way.

While I didn’t love the book as much as its ardent admirers do, I’d say that overall it’s pretty good. I wish it were spookier and that we learned more about Jack—the most intriguing of the human characters—but it was still fun to take part in the tradition.

The Push by Ashley Audrain
Maternal instincts have never run strong in Blythe Connor’s lineage. As a result, she doubts her own ability to be a good mother, but when her husband Fox is enthusiastic to start a family, she relents. Things don’t go well with their first child, a girl named Violet, and Blythe is miserable, exhausted, detached, and neglectful. She’s also convinced something is wrong with their daughter, while Fox ascribes any difficulties to Blythe herself. As Violet gets older, she torments her classmates and was also potentially responsible for a fatal playground accident. (Blythe suspects this is the case, but can’t be sure.) After a few years, Blythe conceives again, and this time her bond with her son Sam is immediate and strong. Unfortunately, it’s clear from the start that Sam is not long for this world.

I’ve seen The Push described as a thriller, but that’s not really accurate. It’s more of a psychological portrait of a mother with a traumatic past who can’t trust her own perceptions regarding her daughter’s possible sociopathy. At first, I wondered if I would be able to identify with a story that was so steeped in motherhood, as a person who has never had even the remotest desire to procreate. As it turned out, I identified with Blythe to an immense degree, as someone who suffers from anxiety, and is prone to think something is wrong when it isn’t… unless it actually is. I often doubt my own perceptions and have been told more than once that I’m making something out of nothing, as Fox tells Blythe.

Some aspects of the story are predictable (especially a name drop you know is going to develop a certain way later), but that didn’t bother me. I thought the portrayal of Blythe’s grief was agonizing (in a good way), and I really appreciated that she does some genuinely unhinged stuff, causing me to wonder whether she might be an unreliable narrator after all. On the negative side, because the whole book is told in the form of Blythe explaining her side of the story to Fox, we don’t gain access into anyone else’s thoughts, and as a result, I’m not entirely sure where Violet was coming from throughout. She claimed to hate her mother, but yet wanted to be wanted by her? I suppose those two things are not mutually exclusive.

Ultimately, although there are a few things I could quibble with, I thought The Push was excellent and engrossing. I look forward to reading more from this author!

lippman2To the Power of Three by Laura Lippman
Kat, Perri, and Josie had been friends since the third grade. But in their senior year of high school, a rift develops and Perri is no longer talking to the other two. Many speculate that it has something to do with Kat, only looking for more extracurricular activities with which to pad her college application, ending up with the lead in the school musical instead of Perri, the serious drama student. Neither girl will explain, not even to Josie, but nobody expects Perri to bring a gun to school and shoot Kat in the girls’ bathroom.

With Kat dead and Perri in a coma after turning the gun on herself, Josie is left to explain events to the police. Only, she’s used to letting Perri do the talking and her story is not adding up for the detectives, who note some discrepancies between Josie’s version of events and the physical evidence. Of course, we do get the whole story eventually. Some reviewers have been disappointed in the ending, but though some scenes are a little clunky—particularly one in which the lead detective makes a special trip to Josie’s house seemingly just to explain a detail about a locked stall door—I liked how it builds upon hints that Kat had never been as nice nor as perfect as people had believed her to be.

In between, we learn the history of the trio’s friendship and their interactions with some uncool farm girls, one of whom has a secret about the shooting, a fact that readers are reminded about approximately eleven times. We also learn about the idealistic young guidance counselor, the fractious relationship between Kat’s now-divorced parents, Perri’s friend from drama club who knew she had the gun but didn’t want to risk losing her friendship by telling anyone about it, and the recent college graduate with cinematic ambitions who used to date Kat and who is still strangely compelled to try to earn her father’s approval.

It’s a lot and it probably goes on a bit too long, but I did find it interesting and look forward to reading more Lippman in the future.

The Reincarnated Princess Spends Another Day Skipping Story Routes, Vol. 6

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By Bisu and Yukiko. Released in Japan as “Tensei Oujo wa Kyou mo Hata o Tatakioru” by Arian Rose. Released in North America by J-Novel Heart. Translated by Esther Sun.

As I got near the end of this volume, with the appearance of one of the characters I least expected to see, I began to realize that everything about this series makes complete sense if you just remember one fact: everyone in the book hates themselves. Now, sometimes this is obvious. Rosemary has humility as deep as the oceans, as high as the sky, to the point where it’s her biggest flaw. But everyone else, when you dig down into their psyche, also seems to suffer from crippling self-loathing and self-doubt. Even Kanon, the otome game heroine who finally gets summoned in this volume, arrives with a heaping helping of “why me?” that does not go away, though events help to reinforce her worries. Hell, even the CAT probably hates himself. The only, bright, sunny confident person in this volume dies only a little ways into it. That said… this is not a giant depressing. bleak read. Though it’s a downer to an extent.

We pick up right where we left off last time, and unfortunately events do not play out with a last-minute reprieve or God being kind. Now back home again, Rosemary has to deal with trying to live up to her father’s theoretical expectations (which are very different in her head from his ACTUAL expectations), the puzzling fact that everyone seems to lose their composure when she’s around them (especially the men), and of course the small problem of the game’s story starting up early, which means that they’re using ancient untested magic to summon a girl from Japan, who can hopefully be the one to contain the demon lord. All this plus mooning over Sir Leonhart. That said, things actually end up going pretty well… until an assassination attempt manages to screw everything up.

First off, I seem to have lost track of how much time all of this is taking, and somewhere along these six books Rosemary has aged 5 years. Since she’s now 15, and will be “an adult” in this book’s world in 6 months, I will try to complain a bit less about every single man in the cast except her father being in love with her. I do think that it’s laid on a bit thick, frankly, but that is kind of the genre of these sorts of romance books, and so I mostly have to sigh and let the flowery prose wash over me. The most interesting part of the book was near the end, where Rosemary’s near-death experience manages to get her mother, who has spent the entire series avoiding her, to her side. Fans of Endo and Kobayashi Live! might find some similarities here, as it turns out that her mother is merely very awkward and bad at love and emotions – a habit she shares with her husband, who admittedly is nicer to his daughter in this book than in the previous five books combined.

There’s two more volumes in this series to go, so I suspect next time we’ll get the darkness before the dawn. Till then, I am enjoying this book about all these sad little royals who have absolutely no idea how to un-sad themselves.

Matcha Made in Heaven, Vols 1-4

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Matcha Made in Heaven, Volumes 1-4 by Umebachi Yamanaka

I need to get over my tendencies of forgetting to keep up with digital only releases, I am bad enough about unread manga when I have piles of it to remind me of my backlog, but I’m even worse when it comes to digital releases. However, sometimes a series is so charming that it sizes my attention, I overcome my usual inertia, and I end up absolutely delighted. This was the case with Matcha Made in Heaven!

Chako is a fairly typical big-city dweller, making her way through life, engaged to be married until she starts having reactions to being surrounded by sexism. When she sees her future Mother-in-Law wiping off her fiance’s feet her immediate feelings of revulsion (and the fact that her fiance is seriously creepy) has her fleeing to the countryside to her family’s traditional tea farm. Chako has been out of touch with her family for some time, so she’s a bit startled when she runs across a little girl named Futaba and a giant stern man named Isshin who demands to know what she’s doing in the house. It turns out that Isshin has taken over the family tea business while Chako’s brother works as a writer on the side to earn extra income. Being a writer apparently means abandoning all household duties, as Isshin is basically acting as Futuba’s guardian as well as working in the fields. He makes a comment about how Chako’s not going to be suited to working on her family’s farm and her instinct to rage against sexism and prove him wrong is awakened

matcha made in heaven

Chako’s mysterious yet terrible ex-fiancee shows up at the farm, and in attempt to dodge him, she leaps onto Isshin as he drives a tractor in the fields with Futaba, claiming that he’s her husband. Futuba is absolutely delighted by this development and obviously not over the death of her mother and her absentee father, so Isshin and Chako agree to go through the motions of having a fake marriage. This also has the benefit of all of the neighbors backing off a little bit from trying to set Isshin up. A fake marriage of convenience isn’t a terribly surprising story to structure a multi-volume manga around, but Yamanaka’s execution is top notch. Futuba is an amusing combination of needy 4 year-old and an old soul who is filled with delight about Chako and Isshin’s slowly developing relationship. Isshin is passionate and expressive only about tea, but Chako finds herself more and more charmed by him as she gets to know him.

matcha made in heaven

A fake marriage is nothing without additional obstacles to overcome, and they appear in Chako’s old friend Jin and Isshin’s ex-girlfriend who happens to be the heir to a tea conglomerate. The art is expressive and delicate, with Isshin’s normally stoic expressions only shifting when he’s enraptured by tea or utterly perplexed at how to react to Chako’s presence in his life. I enjoyed the slice-of-life aspect to Match Made in Heaven combined with all the details of tea farming, blending tea, going to markets and trying to salvage a struggling family business. I recommended this series for those who like uncomplicated josei romance.

Yashiro-kun’s Guide to Going Solo: After Story

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By Dojyomaru and Kou Kusaka. Released in Japan as “Yashiro-kun no Ohitori-sama Kouza” by Overlap Bunko. Released in North America by J-Novel Club. Translated by Andria McKnight.

Allow me to quote the end of my review of Yashiro-kun’s Guide to Going Solo: “This is a single volume – it wouldn’t work as a continuing series.” And now there’s a second volume, and it’s FINE, I guess, but after reading it I still stand by that sentence. This book did not need to be written. It sort of reminds me of what Nisioisin said about Nisemonogatari, where he claims to have written it for fun and never intended it to be published. Now, I’m fairly sire that’s bullshit in regards to the Monogatari Series, but this book has the same feel. There’s tons of in-jokes and references (yes, Souma from Realist Hero shows up again), there’s lots of meandering cute conversations, and we get to see more of the girl who was the “mystery” of the first book. But there’s no real plot here, because the series has nowhere further to go. Not even a flashforward showing married with children can really help there. It is a good, but superfluous, book.

After said flashforward, we get the bulk of the book, which involves a field trip to Kamakura. During this trip, everyone has to form a group, so we get Yashiro and Nue, Kanon and Chikaze, and Yukito and that new girl, Yuzuki. That said, the group has to prove they’re together at the start and end of the day, but in between can do whatever they want. So everyone breaks off to do things separately… but ends up in groups of two regardless. Kanon and Nue end up traveling to a hot spring together, Yashiro and Chikaze go on a mountain hike, and Yukito and Yuzuki go on what is totally not a date. In the end, fun is had and they all return home, with the main thing happening being that Kanon has gotten Nue to open up a little more to her.

There is some good characterization here, though as with the previous book it sometimes suffers because of its odd premise (loner nerds are now admired while popular kids are pitied, in case you’d forgotten). After discovering that Yashiro actually has had a girlfriend all along, the two girls who were falling for him have to get over him. Kanon does this pretty much immediately, and her scenes with Nue were probably the book’s highlight. Chikaze takes longer, and has to have it ground into her head a bit how soppy Yashiro is for his girlfriend before she lets it go. Also, some of the in-jokes really land well – I loved Yashiro and Nue imagining what would have happened if Nue had met Kanon before she met Yashiro, and the answer is “this would be a Manga Time Kirara series instead”.

The author wants to write more, but admits that this does not sell nearly as well as Realist Hero, so it’s unlikely. If you like plotless meandering with cute teenagers, this is a good read. But was this trip really necessary?

Harlequin Manga: Valentines, Revenge, and Secrets

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Sometimes when reading one wants the equivalent of a decadent Sacher-Torte and other times one might want is a Ho Ho Snack Cake. Is Harlequin manga good? Could the question essentially be meaningless? Sometimes the combination of hackneyed plot tropes and rushed manga adaptations comes together to produce something extraordinary, although most of the time I tend to find it adequate and that’s ok! Sometimes you just want to eat a Ho Ho or read a Harlequin manga. There’s fortunately plenty of selection available on Kindle Unlimited and here are three that I’ve read recently in honor of Valentine’s Day:

Valentine Vendetta by Sharon Kendrick and Miho Tomoi

Valentine Vendetta is the story of a successful party planner named Fran Fisher. Her alcoholic friend Rosie claimed to have been callously used for sex by Sam Lockhart. Rosie wants to be smuggled into a party that Fran is planning so she can confront this terrible womanizer. When Fran shows up at Sam’s house she’s a bit surprised that he’s living in a mansion in the country as a literary agent. Even more mysterious is the fact that Sam is sporting some unconvincing stubble in the first few panels that introduce him, but then he leaves Fran to take a call and comes back clean-shaven. Was he really taking a phone call? What happened with his beard? I honestly spent most of this manga speculating about stubble and wondering when it was coming back only for that mystery to remain unresolved. Sam drives Fran to the train station, and she’s immediately attracted to the messy state of the backseat of his car, it doesn’t match up with the playboy image she has in her head.
Fran just learns how wrong her assumptions were when Rosie and a pack of other women show up and cause a scene at Sam’s Valentine’s Party, and it turns out that they are all upset because they were essentially stalking him! Fran’s put her party planning business on the line for some extremely questionable reasons! Sam however keeps popping up in Fran’s life, she learns more about him and his family and eventually falling in love with him! Miho Tomoi’s adaptation is clear and easy to follow, but I would have appreciated a bit more visual interest, just because the plotline of this title was fairly bland. I wanted more vendettas!

Valentine Vendetta

Alexei’s Passionate Revenge by Helen Bianchin and Yu Mahara

After being a bit let down by Valentine Vendetta, I was hoping for more dramatic plot twists in Alexi’s Passionate Revenge. Revenge doesn’t work when it is too dispassionate, does it? This volume kicks off with Natalya Montgomery being blackmailed into working for the CEO who bought out her father’s company who happens to be her ex-boyfriend Alexi. Now Natalia is stuck being Alexi’s personal assistant unless she wants the secret of her father’s affairs to be released to the media. The plot of this story proceeds in a lovely smorgasbord of tropes including parental alienation, a pregnancy scare, a private villa in New Zealand, a gay best friend, and even more complications that ensured just because Alexi and Natalia had actually managed to have a conversation about their feelings before engaging in blackmail-based business practices. The character designs and illustrations for Alexi’s Passionate Revenge were a bit blocky, and not as delicate as I would have liked, although it was all adept enough. One thing I’m not a fan of is that the revenge in this story was pretty one-sided. Where’s Natalya’s revenge? I hope that she’s planning on something in the future but I won’t count on it.

Alexi's Passionate Revenge


Her Secret Valentine by Helen Brooks and Akemi Maki

This manga has more of the old school quality to the art that I enjoy in Harlequin manga adaptations, although even that isn’t enough to save it from a rather lackluster story with little dramatic tension. Everyone’s eyelashes are three inches long and the heroine has starry eyes all the time. In my mind, this makes up for a certain lack of detail in the backgrounds. Ward Ryan is a widower with a young daughter. Jeanie is his colleague at a law firm who has been crushing on him for years. Ward discovers her crying with frustration about her crush at the office one day and invites him home for dinner. He’s assumes that she’s crying over a man, and says that Jeanie’s imaginary boyfriend is no good for her! Jeanie helps out at Ward’s daughter’s birthday party and they grow closer, while Ward becomes more and more upset that Jeanie’s man doesn’t appreciate her. It is fairly amusing to constantly hear Ward bashing himself to Jeanie. Eventually Jeanie decides that she can’t keep nurturing her crush and quits the law firm, and Ward decides to start pursuing her. Really, there wasn’t very much dramatic tension in this story, and the curly eyelashes didn’t make up for it.

Her Secret Valentine

I would say that out of the three of these volumes, Alexi’s Passionate Revenge was probably the best example of the genre, there were enough inexplicable and yet entirely predictable plot twists to satisfy most Harlequin manga connoisseurs. Now that I’ve revived my Harlequin manga habit, I will continue my quest to find the perfect example of insane plot points and rose-petal filled art.

The Ideal Sponger Life, Vol. 10

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By Tsunehiko Watanabe and Jyuu Ayakura. Released in Japan as “Risou no Himo Seikatsu” by Hero Bunko. Released in North America by J-Novel Club. Translated by MPT.

Gonna be honest, I have not warmed to Lucretia yet. Frankly, I’d be happier with Bona as a 2nd concubine, as the two of them could nerd out together. That said, after getting Lucretia’s backstory here, we certainly see why she’s so desperate to seduce Zenjiro and get into his good graces. Unfortunately, we know our hero better than she does, so she keeps striking out over and over here. It takes Freya spelling it out for Lucretia to get her to change her approach: any attempts to make Zenjiro fall in love with anyone but Aura are doomed to fail. Accept this is a purely political negotiation. She’s in a much stronger position there, especially when her family offers Freya something that, as she herself narrates, she would kill for. But in terms of audience appeal… I think I’m not alone in not really warming to her, and so she’s going to have to work harder in the next few books. But at least now she’ll BE in the next few books, even if she’s still on the outside looking in.

After their error in the last volume, the King and heir to the throne of the Twin Kingdoms are trying to get back into Zenjirou’s good graces, which is unfortunate because he’s still really pissed off. That said, he knows when he can afford to be emotionally furious and when he cannot. Getting a healer is easier, as he negotiates with the Pope there, and it goes very well. A bit too well, in fact. He’s then asked by Freya, who is slowly drying up in the Southern climate, if she can go with him to the Kingdoms to negotiate on behalf of her own nation. This proves to be OK with the Twin Kingdoms as well, who are absolutely delighted to be negotiating with Uppasala. Unnervingly so. What is really going on here?

What’s going on is that the series is now popular enough that things can be planned out for a long-runner, which means we’re setting up plots here for a payoff several books down the road. Honestly, I’m amazed Freya was able to keep her cool as much as she did given the tool they gave her is basically exactly what a nation sailing on a long dangerous voyage would most desperately desire. And then there’s Francesco, still essentially this world’s equivalent of a mad scientist, and trying to invent something that would lead to complete upheaval of the world as everyone knows it. This makes everyone unhappy, but as Zenjirou notes it also may be something that can’t be avoided, so it might be best to control the metaphorical explosion when it happens than to be caught up in it. It might lead to war. The Twin Kingdoms certainly think so.

But yes, Lucretia may be on the cover, and Aura may still be the one Zenjirou loves, but frankly Freya is still the most interesting heroine in these books. I loves her joy when Aura offered her a dress as a gift (which implies she accepts her as Zenjirou’s concubine), which very rightly also got interior art. Given that the next arc will involve Freya’s return home, the author may agree with me.

Fushi no Kami: Rebuilding Civilization Starts with a Village, Vol. 7

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By Mizuumi Amakawa and Mai Okuma. Released in Japan as “Fushi no Kami: Henkyou kara Hajimeru Bunmei Saiseiki” by Overlap. Released in North America by J-Novel Club. Translated by Jade Willis.

I would like to take this point to mock those reviewers who suggested that this was not going to end up with Ash having more than one wife. If I could quote one of those foolish reviews, one… let me check my notes here… Sean Gaffney, he said in the review of the sixth volume “I’m pretty sure this is not a polycule sort of book.” And yet here we are, and the outcome of the 7th book is so little in doubt that I’m even spoiling it in this opening paragraph. There are no more battles with demons or werewolves here, and the only new ridiculous tech is the finished airplane at last. No, this entire book is about politics, about the fact that Ash and the frontier territories have gotten far too powerful for the royal family’s comfort, and how they can get Alicia away from the royal family and back to her rightful place next to Ash and Maika. The cover art tells you how this turns out.

After the events of the previous book, refugees are flowing into Sacula, and everyone has their hands full trying to find ways to not have them dying in the streets or turning into bandits to stay alive. Towards that end, they have asked for help from the central territories and the royal family. Unfortunately, the king is ambivalent and also weak, and the crown prince is completely hostile. Fortunately they have Alicia, who gets the help of the Church to send much needed supplies. Unfortunately, she’s proving far too popular, so much so that even though she doesn’t want the throne, some nobles want her to take it anyway. As a result, she’s locked away in the palace. Ash is going to have to find a way to rescue her.

I find it amusing, given how Ash has gone out of his way to avoid taking credit for the many things that he’s spearheaded over the years, that the solution to his problems here is to cash in on all those things, admit they WERE all his doing, and get royal recognition (which essentially comes with an “I get whatever I ask for” coupon). As for the two wives thing, it’s pretty clear from the start that Maika is absolutely fine with this, and as a matter of fact might be more annoyed if Ash didn’t make that the solution. She and Alicia have been close ever since Alicia’s days as “Arthur”, and I can definitely see the two of them teaming up on him in the future. We don’t get a wedding, because in the end it’s the civilization that’s more important than the romance – the real climax of the book is the working plane, not Alicia declaring she loves Ash.

This is the final volume in the series, and a quick epilogue puts a definitive capper on things. It’s just about the right length, and I enjoyed this far more than I was expecting. Please enjoy this ridiculous boy becoming a ridiculous man.

Blood on the Tracks, Vols. 1-5

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One part Mommie Dearest, one part Kids, Blood on the Tracks is an unsettling depiction of the toxic parent-child relationship between Seiko, an overbearing mother, and Seiichi, her thirteen-year-old son.

The first volume is an artful tease, frankly portraying Seiko’s controlling behavior while encouraging the reader to see it through her obedient son’s eyes: as an expression of parental love. Oshimi hints that Seiko’s attachment to Seiichi goes beyond a simple desire to protect him, but it isn’t until a fateful hiking trip that Seiko’s true ability to manipulate and terrorize Seichii is revealed. In the aftermath of the trip, Seiichi begins to question his earliest childhood memories, and forms a connection with his classmate Yuko, another teen caught in a toxic parent-child relationship. The teens’ effort to break free of abuse, however, is thwarted by their age and by Seiichi’s deep-seated guilt about running away from home; the final page of volume five shows Seiichi abandoning Yuko under a highway overpass to search for his mother, rain and tears streaming down his face.

I’d be the first to admit that Blood on the Tracks is a potent reminder of just how good an artist Oshimi is. No matter what genre he’s working in, he does a superb job of creating fully embodied characters whose facial expressions, gaits, and vocal tics reflect their lived experiences; we can see how socially and emotionally stunted Seiichi is from the way he slouches and stands on the fringes of his friend group at school, and from his difficulty making eye contact with other people. Even more striking is how fluidly Oshimi segues from crisp naturalism to abstraction, using the latter as a way of representing how feelings manifest not as fully formed thoughts but as vivid, unsettling images that intrude on everyday life. Oshimi’s expressive linework and creative use of perspective give these sequences a visceral authenticity that would be almost impossible to achieve with language. 

In this scene, for example, Oshimi shows us the turning point in Seiko’s relationship with his mother. The first image in the sequence offers a fleeting glimpse of Seiko as Seiichi used to see her: as a beautiful young woman who devoted her life to protecting her son from harm. The second and third images in the sequence, however, reveal how Seiichi now sees her: as a terrifying stranger, a point reinforced by his wide-eyed stare and the faint smirk on Seiko’s lips. Oshimi sharply contrasts the beauty of the setting with the horror of what just transpired, creating a visual analog for Seiichi’s shock at learning who his mother really is.

The stumbling block—for me, at least—is that Oshimi’s stories always veer into the uncomfortable terrain of transgressive behavior and power dynamics. His characters exhibit such destructive, sadistic tendencies that his work often leaves me feeling queasy, not least because so many of his protagonists are teenagers. Maybe that’s the point: we can’t understand what it’s like to live with a pathologically selfish person unless Oshimi uses jump scares and creepy close-ups to make us feel the same sense of apprehension that Seiichi does. Yet there’s something distressing about making entertainment out of this material, however convincing his portrayal of Seiko’s pathology may be; I couldn’t shake the feeling that watching Seiko squeeze the life out of her son was a kind of emotional torture porn. I threw in the towel with volume five, but your mileage may vary.

BLOOD ON THE TRACKS, VOLS. 1-5 • BY SHUZO OSHIMI • TRANSLATED BY DANIEL KOMEN • VERTICAL

The Abandoned Heiress Gets Rich with Alchemy and Scores an Enemy General!, Vol. 1

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By Miyako Tsukahara and Satsuki Sheena. Released in Japan as “Suterare Reijō wa Renkinjutsu-shi ni Narimashita. Kaseida Okane de moto Tekikoku no Shō o Kōnyū Shimasu” by PASH! Books. Released in North America by Cross Infinite World. Translated by piyo.

I don’t think I’ve ever seen a book try to get the reader to abandon it and walk away quite as much as the start of this book. First off, and this is less the fault of the author than the fact that English-speaking fans are VERY tired of this by now, the very first chapter is called “The Abandoned Heiress Purchases a Slave Swordsman”. Those of you following the Sugar Apple Fairy Tale anime will know how this goes, but it’s still a side-eye moment. Things are not improved by the two leads snarking at each other egregiously for the first 40 or so pages – indeed, Chloe’s banter feels very forced and unnatural. Then, as you read on, you realize that this is not a fault with the writing but a fault with Chloe, and things get a lot more interesting. It’s not a must-read, but by the end of the book I was perfectly satisfied.

Chloe is an alchemist, and she’s just purchased Julius so he can help her kill monsters, which will get her materials so that she can do more alchemy and make more money. Both have tragic pasts. Chloe was a duke’s daughter, but when her stepsister arrived she became the unfavorite, and then when her father was accused of crimes and executed, she was thrown out onto the street. Julius, meanwhile, was a general for another country, and as part of the peace agreements was sold to the enemy and forced to fight in an arena for three years. Chloe responds to all this by keeping up an optimistic, cheery front that hides a very fragile young woman, while Julius has simply given up on life altogether. Fortunately, both are very good for each other, and they’ll have to rely on each other more as it turns out that Chloe’s past is still very much in the present.

This is the first of a series of books Cross Infinite World licensed from PASH!, best known here for the Kuma Bear novels, and it’s not a bad choice. I enjoy unreliable narrators, so seeing Chloe’s chipper yet slightly fake running monologue and constant praising of herself made me look for something more, and I was rewarded. Julius, meanwhile, is a jerk to Chloe at first, in the best shoujo manga tradition, but, like the better shoujo manga with that trend, he gets better. The book is very much a ‘game’ fantasy in the way that monsters, when they die, happen to drop labeled items you can use in alchemy, but honestly, that’s par for the course now. Its biggest flaw may be that it’s a stand-alone – there’s hints of Chloe’s alchemy mentor that go nowhere, and the eventual bad guy doing all this gets away and things stay unresolved. So in terms of plot it’s not great. But in terms of romance it’s absolutely fine.

That said, there does appear to be a second book in the series due out in Japan in March. Till then, if you like disgraced heroines falling for hot guys with sharp tongues, this is a good choice.

Mixed Bathing in Another Dimension: Heavenly Bath of the Seven Goddess Sisters

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By Nagaharu Hibihana and Masakage Hagiya. Released in Japan as “Isekai Konyoku Monogatari” by Overlap Bunko. Released in North America digitally by J-Novel Club. Translated by Sophie Guo.

I was going to make several jokes about the lengthy wait for this final volume of Mixed Bathing in Another Dimension, but it turns out I made them all in my previous review, which also had a lengthy delay between volumes. Not nearly as long as this one, though. The last time this series came out was pre-COVID. Fortunately, this is the final volume, so we won’t have to worry about it anymore. As for the book itself, it has all the strengths and weaknesses of the rest of the series. I’ve always liked this more than it probably deserves, and that remains the case. But the book is, like its hero, just so goshdang earnest that it’s hard to dislike. There are really no surprises here, no last-minute twists. There are also (thankfully) no new women added to the bath pile, which is good, because as I noted in my previous book, I’ve long since forgotten who is who, with the exception of the tiny cast list at the start.

We pick up where we left off, which is annoying as I did not remember where we left off. But basically one of the summoned heroes, Nakahana, has turned evil and is using her gift, which is essentially “sleeplearning”, to brainwash people and have her own little army of handsome men. Fortunately, Haruno’s powers can dispel this gift, but it’s a one-by-one process, so it won’t be that easy. They’ve got to infiltrate a castle, steal the king, and then go to war with a brainwashed army. And try not to kill anyone, because most of the army is brainwashed, not evil. And then there’s the actual task that Touya has to do, which is to rebuild Hades and set up a massive temple with shrines to all six goddesses… which will allow most of them to once again reappear in this world. Fortunately, y’know, he has a bath.

On the minus side, Touya’s narration still tends to sound like he’s reading us his shopping list sometimes, and the book also can’t stop going on about “ripe melons” and “obscene tits” until your eyes get damaged from rolling them back. And everyone’s just so NICE. On the pus side, that’s because, in the end, this is a found family title rather than a harem romance. There’s no romantic resolution here, though you get the sense that eventually he’ll end up with several women. But it’s irrelevant, their bonds as family and friends are more important. Also, I appreciated how the book used its OP heroes. Touya and Haruno are both ludicrously overpowered… and so the book comes up with actual obstacles that stop them simply being OP, and forces them to strategize and think. And, as with previous books, the women all do a lot here, particularly Haruno, who gets badass interior art (unbrainwashing four knights with karate chops to the head) and comedy/sexy interior art (where she accidentally shows Touya her naked body while trying to meditate).

So yeah, still not recommending this to anyone but fans who don’t mind a breast fetish. But leaving that aside, this remains a flawed but pleasant series, with a very likeable cast, and I’m glad it finally got released.

Ascendance of a Bookworm: I’ll Do Anything to Become a Librarian!, Part 5: Avatar of a Goddess, Vol. 2

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By Miya Kazuki and You Shiina. Released in Japan as “Honzuki no Gekokujou: Shisho ni Naru Tame ni wa Shudan wo Erandeiraremasen” by TO Books. Released in North America by J-Novel Club. Translated by quof.

It has to be said here: Ehrenfest is absolutely terrifying. I mention this mostly as, to a reader, that may not be the case. We’ve been with Rozemyne since the start of the series, in her home duchy, and we know its people. We also know that she is the equivalent of a human nuclear weapon, and that they’ve been desperately trying to hold her back for the most part. But to lesser duchies (like, say, Jossbrenner, who get the bulk of the short stories here), their meteoric rise has to be explained by evil. It’s the only way the rumors make sense, because otherwise, you’d have to accept that their entire change in fortune is down to the machinations of one book gremlin… who honestly doesn’t care all that much about where her duchy ranks as long as she gets books. And then we get this volume, where she talks to the King like she talks to everyone else. And produces multiple magical sacred items. What *is* Rozemyne? They just don’t know.

As always with these huge books packed with STUFF, there’s too much to recap, and I apologize for leaving out Detlinde’s excruciating tea party. But the two important things in this book are: 1) Ehrenfest and Dunkelfelger release their joint research, showing the efficacy of prayer and belief in gaining blessings, and proceed to have a demonstration which will involve (Rozemyne thinks) two of the three princes, but actually involves ALL the princes, and the King. The other duchies are somewhat stunned, but hey, it’s for the good of the country, right? Then we get 2), where Lestilaut finally snaps and challenges Wilfried to a game of “bride-stealing ditter” for Rozemyne’s hand. Rozemyne, unable to figure out a way to get out of this, then says that if Dunkenfelger lose somehow, Hannelore has to marry into Ehrenfest’s duchy. Hannelore, who is Dunkenfelger’s archduke candidate. Clearly this will be Safe And Fun.

Much as Leslilaut is an absolute ass in this volume, and I cannot wait for his inevitable downfall next time, he has a point: Wilfried is still pretty terrible as a leader of men, and as a minder of Rozemyne he borders on pathetic. That said, he does get a moment at the end when you cheer for him, when he goes to rescue (and not to capture) Hannelore. I tend not to think about romance too much for this series, mostly as it involves admitting who Rozemyne will end up with, which I’m still trying to ignore, but Wilfried and Hannelore would make quite a cute couple. Unfortunately, given Hannelore’s exceptionally bad luck, I can’t see it happening. Oh yes, and the library now has enough mana to open up some new sections, which will no doubt end up being important down the line.

So much happened in this book that it’s difficult to accept that it’s all just setup for future books, but there we go. That said, Bookworm is great whether it’s setting up pins or knocking them over, and I always love Rozemyne’s “common sense” causing everyone around her to faint or have a migraine. Keep up with this series.