Category Archives: reviews

Betrothed to My Sister’s Ex, Vol. 1

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By Tobirano and Mai Murasaki. Released in Japan as “Zutaboro Reijou wa Ane no Moto Konyakusha ni Dekiai Sareru” by M Novels f. Released in North America by Airship. Translated by Rymane Tsouria. Adapted by Zubonjin.

Ah, it’s time for another of my favorite genres. No, not Cinderella story, although this is that as well. No, it’s the classic shoujo light novel genre of “I am so horribly abused by my family that my self-worth is garbage and I will spend volumes trying to like myself”. Generally speaking, these books live and die on their heroine. Sometimes they suffer stoically, such as The Too-Perfect Saint (this will not be the last time I mention The Too-Perfect Saint in this review). Sometimes they are such pollyannas that the abuse doesn’t even register as such. And sometimes they just accept that they’re terrible and ugly and awful because that’s what their parents say, and live a life of quiet desperation. That’s where Marie is at the start of this book. Fortunately, we know that things will get much better for her, but the challenge, with someone like Marie, is to make her accept that she deserves to have good things happen to her at all.

The title may throw off the savvy reader, who sees it and expects an evil sister to go along with the evil parents. In fact, Marie’s sister Anastasia is the only good thing in her life, and the two of them get along great (Much like Too-Perfect Saint). Unfortunately, Marie’s parents REALLY despise her. They force her to do all the chores – yes, they have servants, but why use them when you have Marie? – and her 18th birthday party is hijacked and used as an excuse to get a rich husband for her sister. A proposal soon arrives from Kyros, a Count who’s going to be a Duke when he inherits. The parents could not be happier. Anastasia is, frankly, terrified, but she goes to his country… and dies in a carriage accident along the way. Now they have to send Marie, the “horrible” sister. (Again, Too-Perfect Saint, yes.) Marie, who is not only grieving for her sister but being told she’s only useful as a womb and that she should never have been born, meekly goes along. Fortunately, a series of misunderstandings mean that her welcome is much nicer than expected.

An anime of this has aired in the summer (so no spoilers for the second book in the comments, please), and everyone agreed that the absolute best thing about this title was Mio, Kyros’ head maid. They’re absolutely correct, Mio is indeed the best thing. She’s a badass, snarky, caring, and has an appetite for food that boggles the mind. She helps both of her charges, though finds herself exasperated with Kyros, whose screw-up (he met Marie at the party when she was hiding in the garden and fell in love with her, but assumed, as it was a party to engage the other sister, that she was Anastasia) led to all this. I also like what little we see of Anastasia, who loves to sew masculine outfits for women and wishes she were in a different type of shoujo light novel (the “my family goes under and I have to become a merchant” kind). As for Marie, well, her growth is the point, but I will warn folks, her self-hatred oozes from almost every line she has till near the end, and she cannot accept anything good happening to her. This is understandable, but readers might balk.

Not me, though. I want more of this. It’s like catnip.

ATLAS: Her, the Combatant, and Him, the Hero, Vol. 1

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By John Rohman and ttl. Released in North America by J-Novel Club.

This is another of the J-Novel Club Original Light Novel contest winners. In fact, this is the Grand Prize Winner. That said, I had put it off, mostly as the description made it seem sort of futuristic sci-fi dystopia, which is generally not my genre. And it certainly is that genre, but there’s more going on here than that. This is a story of two seemingly ordinary people who really aren’t, forced into a role that emphasizes how special they actually are. There’s a lot of prejudice and class struggle in this world (we see that on the “her” side), but even if you are comparatively privileged you can still end up being forced into things by those richer and more powerful than you (the “him” side). Of course, there’s also things familiar to light novel/anime fans here. Super sentai armor, lots of cool shonen battles, and powers that remind me a whole lot of My Hero Academia. That said, the main reason to read the book are her and him. They’re great characters, and even better when they interact with each other.

Calli is a young woman struggling to get a job in his world that is very prejudiced against those with her hair and skin. She’s a Stratan, and got an opportunity to make something of herself, which she is trying to do so she doesn’t have to crawl back home as a failure. Unfortunately, all she can find is temp work, and her co-workers mostly hate her on sight. Then she’s offered a special job. Meanwhile, Genesis is a young man who’s in charge of a loading dock where an explosion occurs. He got everyone out without injury, miraculously. A bit TOO miraculously, though, and the richest man in the city took note of it and wonders if he’s hiding a secret. A secret that might also give him a different job. Can these two people who end up opposing each other find common ground? And can you really meet cute when you’re a cop and a terrorist – sort of?

I won’t lie, this book starts slow as it serves up its worldbuilding, and I found the flashfoward at the start (which we never catch up to) somewhat pointless. But it gets better as it goes along, especially when it gets to the first big action sequence on the train. The best scene, though, is when Calli and Genesis meet cute for the SECOND time, and finally give in and decide to go grab some pizza. What ensues is a fantastic conversation as the two of them try to bitch about their respective new jobs without giving anything away… all while not realizing that they’d been desperately fighting each other earlier that day. Despite essentially being a terrorist for the money, Calli has a good head on her shoulders and cares about people, but she knows that sometimes you have to survive. As for Genesis, he wants to be a real hero, but finds his job doesn’t want that, and also some of the most famous heroes out there are just in it so they can beat the shit out of “bad guys”. Ideals are tough.

This ends the way most contest winners do, I assume, as it has enough of an ending to satisfy while still clearly promising more. I enjoyed her. And him.

My Friend’s Little Sister Has It In for Me!, Vol. 11

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By mikawaghost and tomari. Released in Japan as “Tomodachi no Imouto ga Ore ni dake Uzai” by GA Bunko. Released in North America by J-Novel Club. Translated by Alexandra Owen-Burns.

It’s been well over two years since the last volume of this series, and that volume was a massive flashback, so it’s actually been almost three years since we were last dealing with Akiteru’s confrontation with Iroha’s mother. Since then an anime has been announced and is currently airing (I’m not watching it, but I don’t think it’s setting the world on fire). Also since then we’ve had just this book. The author apologizes for it taking so long (it was two and a half years between 10 and 11 in Japan). Fortunately, it’s a very solid volume, which mostly goes how I thought it would, but also contains a few surprises. The surprises are not related to Iroha, who honestly takes this a lot better than I’d expected. No, it’s something unrelated to the game or to Iroha’s voice acting, it’s Mashiro’s writing. In which we learn what happens when producers decide to adapt something into an anime without actually enjoying the work itself.

The confrontation between Iroha’s mother and Iroha’s crush ends pretty much as you’d expect. Amachi agrees to let Iroha continue to do her acting work… but she’ll be the one managing her career. He has to stay out of it. Possibly realizing that this is never going to work as long as he’s literally next door, Akiteru thus decides to vanish from everyone’s life… though in reality he asks for a temporary job at Canary’s book publisher, where he gains valuable experience at how deal making works in the land of adults. Unfortunately, only Canary knows he’s there, so the rest of the cast are feeling rather bereft. Iroha at least has a new job she’s doing providing multiple voices for a VTuber project… but when Mashiro is told that the anime team wants to change her anti-bullying revenge fantasy so there’s no revenge and the bullies don’t get harmed, she goes completely to pieces.

As I said, the most startling scene in this whole book for me was the fact that Mashiro showed up for the meeting with the anime team with a gun in her pocket. Yes, it was a model gun that doesn’t shoot, but still. Her yakuza fantasy may have helped her get through the meeting without breaking down, but it did not stop her breaking down after. Actually, “after” may be the biggest flaw with this volume – it feels like it was being written to a page count. There are several plot points (Mashiro, Akiteru’s schooling) where I wish we’d gotten a bit more closure than we did. We did get some great background on Canary, though, which reminds us that sometimes when you work in an industry where you promote others, and you screw up, you can destroy lives that are not yours. I also enjoyed Akiteru being reminded “your uncle is famous, so throw his name around a bit”. Sometimes being an adult means not being straight and narrow all the time.

This author loves to start new series, and start new series that get anime adaptations, so it may be a while before we get the 12th book. That said, with the new events here, I don’t think it’s wrapping up soon anymore.