Good week! 4 books and 1 manga.
HOWL’S MOVING CASTLE, Diana Wynne Jones
CASTLE IN THE AIR, Diana Wynne Jones
HOUSE OF MANY WAYS, Diana Wynne Jones
IS IT WRONG TO TRY TO PICK UP GIRLS IN A DUNGEON? VOL. 1 LIGHT NOVEL, Fujino Omori
GIGANT, VOL. 1, Hiroya Oku
The moving castle trilogy was 2/3s excellent and 1/3 fine. The first book is a delightful fairy-tale that I adored every page of. Its sequel, while not quite reaching the heights of its predecessor was also a blast and a fun riff on the tales of the Arabian Nights. HOUSE OF MANY WAYS however was a let down. I never really cared about the plot and actively disliked the protagonist. Also, its ties to the characters of the first 2 books were not very interesting and felt like in the years since she’d written them last Jones sort of forgot how to write them? I dunno. I’m interested to read more of her books though because I LOVED the first 2 and while I wasn’t a huge fan of the final volume it was still a decent enough fantasy.
So. Is it wrong to try to pick up girls in a dungeon? We still don’t know the answer. I read this purely as some junkfood trash to pick at because I liked the anime. I can say that I enjoyed reading it, but it’s also the most I’ve ever enjoyed a book that was as HORRIBLY written as this. I don’t know how much is the translation and how much is the book itself… but, yeah. Just utter dogshit. I sort of knew that going in, but I was still surprised just how bad it was. I will probably read the next one when I next need a very stupid book I can read when I’m too tired to even bother TRYING to spin up my brain.
GIGANT is wild. There’s no way to describe it without sounding like a degenerate? This dude makes friends with his favorite porn star? and she has massive breasts? and then she gets a weird, mysterious power to grow really big like Super Chief in the old Hanna Barberra cartoons? The art is amazing and even though the premise is… out there? I really liked it and am a fan of all of Oku’s previous work so I preordered the next volume.
joezone 