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The Twelve Kingdoms, Book Six: A Thousand Miles of Wind, the Sky at Dawn, Part 2

By Fuyumi Ono and Akihiro Yamada. Released in Japan as “Kaze no Banri, Reimei no Sora” by X Bunko White Heart. Released in North America by Seven Seas Entertainment. Translated by Kim Morrissy. Adapted by Monica Sullivan. This is a book – well, the whole series is, but especially this book – with a message. This whole volume shows us what life is like in a city, and indeed a county, that is so used to corruption and venality that it doesn’t even matter that the new queen is supposed to be better than the old one, things will still continue. We see, over and over in this book, the normal law-abiding folks turning away whenever there’s something horrible going on – or worse, cheering it on – because they’re…

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Nia Liston: The Merciless Maiden, Vol. 10

By Umikaze Minamino and Katana Canata. Released in Japan as “Kyōran Reijō Nia Liston: Byōjaku Reijō ni Tenseishita Kami-goroshi no Bujin no Kareinaru Musō Roku” by HJ Bunko. Released in North America by J-Novel Club. Translated by okaykei. If you have been following A Livid Lady’s Guide to Getting Even: The Anime, and felt that she was perhaps going a bit TOO far and getting a bit TOO evil, may I recommend the latest volume of Nia Liston? In which Nia gets very angry, and gets her revenge. But it’s the sort of revenge that may actually make everything better, and, while she confesses this is a surprise to her, no bad guys actually die who are not giant insects. Ah yes, that reminds me: if you like to see…

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Manga the Week of 9/9/26

SEAN: As September crawls along, let’s see what manga and light novels offer us. Yen On moved half its releases back two weeks, so we don’t have quite as much as usual. We get Death March to the Parallel World Rhapsody 25, The Irregular at Magic High School 27, Legend of the Far East’s Savior 2, Lord of Mysteries 4, Playing Death Games to Put Food on the Table 6, Spy Classroom 11, To Sir Without Love, I’m Divorcing You 2 Part 1, and The Vexations of a Shut-In Vampire Princess 11. ASH: I imagine sharing the wealth with the other weeks of the month will make some things easier for some people somewhere. SEAN: Viz debuts The Amazing Digital Circus, a manga adaptation of the popular web series. It…

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From Corporate Drone to Mincemaster! One Order of Dragon Coming Right Up!, Vol. 1

By Minato Minato and Tsukito. Released in Japan as “Makikomarete Shoukan Sareta Genkai OL, Guild Shozoku no [Mamono Kaitai Jou] toshite Funtouchuu ~Dragon desu ka? Mochiron Sabakemasu!~” by Mag Garden Novels. Released in North America by Cross Infinite World. Translated by piyo. I mean, it’s FINE, I guess. I enjoyed reading it. I’ll read more. The main characters are all likeable enough. But god, I do not think I have ever come across a light novel with as little originality as this one, a LN that feels like someone completed a Mad Libs for Isekai and wrote the book based on the results. There’s an office lady so ground down from overwork that the only surprise is that it’s a normal summoning and not “dead from work”. There’s her opposite…

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Assassin Empress Bellreuge

By Aoi Miyamae and Hatori Kyouka. Released in Japan as “Ansatsu Jotei Bellreuge ~Shiitagerareshi Koujo wa Ai o Ete Nariagaru~” by Mag Garden Novels. Released in North America by Cross Infinite World. Translated by Alex Castor. I think for the sake of my sanity I’m going to treat this book the way that I treated Once Upon a Witch’s Death, which also was licensed by Yen as a one-shot and then had future volumes roll out much later in Japan. CIW notably has not called this Volume 1, implying it’s complete in one book. The webnovel is very clearly complete, but this book stops just before the climactic battle and has a bunch of side stories instead. The author says in the afterword they were surprised this got a LN…

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In Another World with Household Spells, Vol. 6

By Rika and HIROKAZU. Released in Japan as “Isekai ni Kita kedo, Seikatsu Mahou shika Tsukaemasen” by Mag Garden Novels. Released in North America by J-Novel Club. Translated by sachi salehi. I don’t think I’ve mentioned Ascendance of a Bookworm in these reviews yet, which is a bit of a surprise. We do have a reincarnated girl who is now in the nobility but knows little about it, trying to earn money for her family by inventing things she remembers from back in Japan. She has a posse of friends and classmates, she has adorable siblings, and she has a dad who’s kinda useless. (Sylvester is the dad I mean in this case.) And she’s even intriguing royalty. But if this is a Bookworm lookee likee, there’s one thing that…

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Tearmoon Empire, Vol. 17

By Nozomu Mochitsuki and Gilse. Released in Japan as “Tearmoon Teikoku Monogatari” by TO Books. Released in North America by J-Novel Club. Translated by Madeleine Willette. We’re now seventeen books into this series, short story collections aside, and Mia has gotten very good at actual princess things. Sure, she sometimes faces death from things like assassins (as in this book, where we get to see something rare in fictional works, armor actually doing its job in a realistic way), but for the most part, Mia is no longer in any danger of the world turning against her and getting guillotined. As such, Mia has to face an even more dangerous fate, and one that so far she has been very bad at stopping: people in the future thinking TOO highly…

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Though I Am an Inept Villainess: Tale of the Butterfly-Rat Body Swap in the Maiden Court, Vol. 11

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. The author speaks in the afterword about having grand plans for a lot of wacky fun in the second half of this arc, but as they began to actually write the book, it became apparent that wacky fun was going to have to take a backseat. This is a serious book, with lots of threats to our heroines and the city as a whole. Reirin herself is still battling her own chronic illness, and has come to terms with the fact that she’ll be dying very soon – something which absolutely terrifies Keigetsu. And then there’s the…

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Repeated Vice: I Refuse to Be Important Enough to Die, Vol. 4

By Kuroakawa Hitsugi and Kushiro Kuki. Released in Japan as “Repeat Vice: Akuyaku Kizoku wa Shinitakunai node Shitennou ni Naru no wo Yamemashita” by HJ Bunko. Released in North America by J-Novel Club. Translated by piyo. We’ve had a couple of “trapped in the world of a game” series with more than one person aware of it, but those tend to go a different way than this one is. Usually you get the main character figuring things out, trying to change their fate, etc. and we get the other character (often an evil heroine) simply waiting for their life to be the same as the game and getting upset when it is not. That’s not what we get here, as there are two people actively trying to push back against…

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