Alya Sometimes Hides Her Feelings in Russian, Vol. 4

October 27, 2023 by Leave a Comment

By Sunsunsun and Momoco. Released in Japan as “Tokidoki Bosotto Russia-go de Dereru Tonari no Alya-san” by Kadokawa Sneaker Bunko. Released in North America by Yen On. Translated by Matthew Rutsohn.

There’s a short story volume due out next, but quite honestly, this one also feels a bit like a short story volume, detailing the wacky adventures of the cast on their summer break. There’s no real through line of plot except Masachika’s crippling self-hatred, and the cliffhanger is one I had sort of guessed, so for the most part this feels a bit disconnected. It is also the horniest book in the series, and this comes from a series that is already pretty horny. That said, it does have one of my least favorite things about light novels, which is the idea, held by both boys and girls, that a man having sexual thoughts is the same as the man doing sexual deeds. There are a whole lot of wacky harem manga situations in this book, and a lot of them lead to Masachika having an erection he’s trying to hide. And that’s OK. He’s a teenage boy. But it’s not OK for him, and he continues to consider himself the worst person in the world. It’s annoying.

The student council is going on a summer vacation to a beach house, but before that we have a few plots involving Masachika and Yuki being themselves. This involves a great deal of sex talk, a fair bit of sibling violence, and an amusement park visit where their secret identities end up getting exposed to Sayaka (who is shocked) and Nonoa (who’d already guessed). Oh yes, and Alya keeps coming over to Masachika’s house when everyone out to do homework, and so far… they’ve done homework. Which annoys her. At the beach house, we get bikinis, swimming, bathing, room switching, and a festival with fireworks, all of which are reasonably cute. Unfortunately, Masachika keeps assuming that he’s screwing everything up, and overcompensates to try to fix it, and ends up hating himself even more by the end of it. He ends up going back to the playground where he played with the foreign kid… who turns out to be someone he knows.

As is pretty typical in the genre, the reader ends up sympathizing with Alya heavily here, despite her accidentally getting groped when Masachika tries to save her from falling onto jagged rocks. (She even trots out the “take responsibility and marry me” chestnut, which I haven’t seen in quite some time.) There’s a whole lot of muttered Russian in this book, which Masachika understands but has to pretend he can’t, but really, she could not be more obvious. Even he gets it at the end of the book. But, as with so many other books in this genre, only one thing is stopping the two from being a couple, and it’s the man’s idea that he’s not good enough for her. To be fair, he has the trauma to back it up, and the scenes we get from his childhood in this book are as depressing as you’d expect. But it’s like eating a marshmallow sandwich where the bread is misery.

Next volume… won’t resolve this cliffhanger. Short story volume. Till then, if you like self-loathing and boobs, this is the perfect title for you.

Filed Under: alya sometimes hides her feelings in russian, reviews

Death’s Daughter and the Ebony Blade, Vol. 6

October 26, 2023 by Leave a Comment

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.

Generally speaking, if you’re trying not to spoil yourself when reading a light novel, there are several things you need to do. Avoiding covers is almost impossible, but you can certainly avoid the color inserts, which tend to spoil. Don’t read the author’s afterword till you’ve finished the book, of course, as it often asks readers what they thought of the plot twist. And, of course, try not to read the table of contents, because chapter titles frequently spoil. And so (spoiling here, sorry), when I saw that the last chapter before the epilogue in this book was called “The Girl Defeated”, I knew what was going to happen. It wasn’t a big surprise, the series ends with the next book, so there had to be SOME point where Olivia loses a fight, just so she’s not all-powerful. That said, I was surprised anyway. The Girl Defeated is an accurate chapter title, but the chapter itself ends very happily. It’s the Epilogue that kills you.

We’re finally at the big battle between Olivia and Felix… well, OK, there are a few other big battles before that that don’t involve our heroes, but honestly, most of them feel like they’re padding out the book, and resolving a romance by having a superior officer say “hey, clueless guy, get married to the girl who has an obvious crush on you” is possibly the most pathetic thing I’ve seen in this series. The important bit, though, is that Olivia’s army is finally losing badly, mostly as the other side are simply better, more experienced soldiers. So she decides to gamble it all on a one-on-one fight with Felix, sending Ashton back to base and taking Claudia and a few others to forge a path to Felix. Their battle is cool, well-balanced, and a fair fight. Alas, this world is currently being taken over by an evil Dark God, and he interrupts things to gloat at Felix and generally be evil.

I have grown used to the fact that this series is very good at writing instant gratification, with scenes that work well as you read them but fall apart the moment you try to think more deeply about the subject. This is not a bad thing – popcorn entertainment is perfectly valid. But it can be hard to review. I did appreciate that (spoilers again, sorry) after spending the entire series searching for him, Olivia is finally reunited with Z right as she’s about to die – I get the sense that he wanted to let her grow at her own pace till he had to intervene. The whole “now I will teach you the ultimate final move” ending is pure shonen, but honestly it’s a delight seeing Olivia’s face as she’s finally reunited with her “father”. Less delightful is that pesky epilogue – I don’t expect a permanent death, as this series is not that dark despite its title, but it certainly ends the book on a sour note.

So great stuff, provided you don’t look too deeply, and provided you let your eyes glaze over whenever a male captain and his female adjutant have a conversation with each other. Tune in next time for the final book.

Filed Under: death's daughter and the ebony blade, reviews

The Sorcerer’s Receptionist, Vol. 4

October 25, 2023 by Leave a Comment

By Mako and Maro. Released in Japan as “Mahousekai no Uketsukejou ni Naritaidesu” by ArianRose. Released in North America digitally by J-Novel Club. Translated by Adam.

It’s been a while. Indeed, it’s been over two years. Long enough for me to forget 90% of the cast and 50% of the plot. Long enough for the book to need a new translator. Long enough for about 100 other romance-focused fantasy series for women to come out over here. But throughout all that, some things never change, so you can rest assured that Nanalie’s every waking moment is taken up with being grumpy about Rockmann 100% of the time. Yes, she realized she’s in love with him last volume, but that’s not going to stop her – if anything, the love has to struggle harder to get out from under the layers and layers of competitive tsundere she’s got draped over her. This is exactly the same as the previous books, which is a shame as it was one of the more annoying parts of the series. That said, the series seemed to wrap up perfectly well with the third book. Is this sequel necessary? Hrm…

Nanalie wished for all the revelations about her in the third volume to be left a state secret, and so they are, thanks to some memory altering, so she’s back to the regular everyday life as a guild receptionist. Or rather, she would be were it not for a rumored time traveling thingummajig that everyone seems to be looking for. Naturally, it exists. Somewhat less naturally, it’s in the form of a garden gnome, like the ones you see on lawns. And it turns out that a noblewoman has used the time travel thing to go back in time so that Rockmann can fall in love with HER and not Nanalie! So now everyone has to pile back in time, disguise themselves as teachers, and try to stop the noblewoman before history is changed forev… wait, the gnome says history can’t really be changed. OK, so we’re all good, then.

Gonna be honest, a lot of this book is a slog. The main reason being what I just told you. Before everyone goes back in time, they’re told that no matter what they do, nothing can really be affected. And that turns out to be true, even when the *real* reason for going back in time is revealed. There’s a threat to Nanalie’s past self… that is kind of pointless, because, again, time travel can’t be used to do that. You’d think that this might be used to get Nanalie to admit her feelings more readily, and they sort of try to burble up at times, but she’s just SO tsundere about everything that it’s not satisfying from a romance novel standpoint. Oh, yes, and we get a sort of cliffhanger ending, so I guess we’re getting a Book 5… which, judging by the ending, promises to immediately break all the stuff they had to fix at the end of Book 3. Good times.

If you really loved this series, you’ll want to read this. If you just liked it, feel free to have Vol. 3 be the end.

Filed Under: reviews, sorcerer's receptionist
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