I'M BACK, FELLOW BOOKWORMS!

Sorry for being away. Spend the holidays with family and wanted to focus on them. It was good times. Since I've been away for a while I'm going to list all the books I've read since we last spoke, with a focus on new stuff. And I read a LOT hanging out with the fam. My anime consumption suffered tremendously, but my bookworm is mad full.

So last we spoke I was making my way though Trapped in a Dating Sim Book 12 and Book 13's release was right around the corner. I finished 12, had to wait like an ENTIRE TWO DAYS, and then started plowing through 13.

Book 12 was a lot of setup but it felt pretty good and reasonable. Lots of character development. And, spoiler alert:

CAUTION: Minor Spoiler Ahead

PEOPLE ACTUALLY TELLING PEOPLE THEY'RE REINCARNATIONS! And surprise, people believe them and nothing bad happens. Who would've figured? Certainly not me for 12 whole volumes.

It felt like Book 12 was really setting up the big bad for the climatic ending, which made me want to dive into 13 ASAP. Oh, and before I forget, Book 12 confirmed Season 2 of Trapped in a Dating Sim!

Next came Book 13. Let me just say, if Book 13 had come out before the awards, I would've have some input on best passage. There's a really strong moment between some characters and I was crying real tears. Yeah, imagine that, a wacky book like Dating Sim contains more drama and emotion than a Disney movie.

Book 13 is the end of the series. I know there are some spin-off series around that aren't in English (Marie's Story) so if those ever get printed in English I might check them out. I will also say that Book 13 ends without tying up every loose end but it does so in a very refreshing way. It's actually a pretty good ending. I was worried for a bit as the novel was coming to a close that the author was like, "quick, I need to come up with new ideas because I can't let this cash cow end!" but thankfully that was not the case. It's actually hard to describe. It's a happy ending, but not a happily ever after ending. It alludes to more story but doesn't feel like a teaser and is definitely not a cliffhanger. Like, despite knowing there's a bunch more in store for the MC you can fill in the blanks yourself. If I had to liken it to something, it would be the ending to the Starship Troopers movie. The war is still ongoing but you get the summary of "they'll keep fighting and they'll win" so you know there's more to the story but you also know how it's going to go for the most part.

WHEW! Okay, that was a lot. Book 13 just blew me away. So much stuff came together so well! Anyway, my emotions were shot at this point so I needed some comfort reading after all that. I KNOW I promised I was going to read Ascendance of a Bookworm but I needed something I could mindlessly read while my brain tank was empty. So I reread the first twelve books of Reincarnated as a Sword again.

I know, I know. It's probably like the 6th time I've gone through those books but I can't help it, okay?! They're my absolute favorite! I WAS reminded about how many typos there are in the translation though, especially after reading stuff like Dating Sim which had very few of those. I even found one typo where they called "Fran" as "Gran". And there were a lot of typos where the translator was fiddling with the wording and extra words are left in or missing. Not so bad that you can't figure out what's going on but still a bit distracting.

AAAANNNYWAY... after my Sword binge I'll be diving into Bookworm next. It was a promise, after all.

Seirei Gensouki: Spirit Chronicles - Volume 10 to 13

I have carried on reading this series, it is losing me a bit but I will probably carry on for a bit longer.

Side note - Are the side stories suppose to be cannon to the story? Some are fairly normal filling in bits between events. Others are having the professor be a teacher on earth and Latifa meeting a magical girl and becoming a fox magical girl.

Rant - Volume 13 Spoilers

The biggest let down is the Liselotte + Latifa meeting.

I don’t know if the author was running out of pages and wanted to end at a cliff hanger to make sure we pick up the next one. But you don’t talk about how the non MC group members were finally going to be able to try more Japanese food and how Liselotte and Latifa were going to actually meet for the first time after just watching each other on the bus for years on earth. Then make it 1 paragraph, saying that the MC had to play party games and ate food!

If this was death March the meeting would have been at least a chapter if not it’s own volume.

Also what ever happened to the Yagamo people? It’s been 11 Volumes since he left and nothing has been said. Were they purely to set up his dedication to his revenge by speaking to his parents graves? The way they spoke made it seem like the master swordsman was going to follow the MC whether he wanted them to or not. I am waiting for them to turn up somewhere.

Reincarnated as a Little Fairy - WN c1-c272 - More web novels this week. This one is a fluffy adventure about happy-go-lucky fairy. MC has aversion to studying so she doesn't want learn the language. Hilarity ensues. It's a bit slow and repetitive but very fluffy and cute with surprisingly decent world building that isn't reveled 200+ chapters into the novel.
I enjoyed it as it was at the right time for that type of read.

The Hungry Fortress Wants to Build a Battleship in Another World – World of Sandbox WN c1-c80 - Even though other reviews compared it to factorio it feels more like RTS. There is not enough resources to build more units to get more resources. It was fun for a bit but it got boring after a while. I really couldn't get immersed into that world.

From Villainess to Healer - vol1 - As I have read it on Monday, I don't remember very much about it. I guess it was another fluffy slice of life adventure where nothing really matters. I enjoyed it as I have immersed myself into that world.

The Water Magician: Arc 1 Volume 3 - Good volume with a lot happenning. It took a bit to get the ball rolling but after the first 60-70 pages that were a slog to get through it switched paces and I wasn't able to put it back down.

To Another World... with Land Mines! Volume 10 - Another volume with a totally unrelated side story just wedged in between 2 directly connected normal chapters. I just don't understand why they do this. The volume has two noteworthy plot points apart from that stupid decision with the chapters. One, there is a ship that finally sailed, and two the the main story and side stories seem to converge and both parties should meet in the next volume. I'm looking forward to this.

Isekai Tensei: Recruited to Another World Volume 9—The series is losing me. The first five or so volumes were entertaining enough, but since then, it has felt like a chore to finish each volume. This volume, for example, basically skips over everything that could be interesting and rather spends around 70% of the volume on the same joke of three side characters fooling around again and again—literally the same joke. It's like reading about the Three Stooges.

The Wild Robot
The Wild Robot Escapes
The Wild Robot Protects

Loved the movie, dove into the books. Written for pretty young readers, 6-8 years old I'd say, but proper chapter books even though most chapters are 1-3 pages long.

If you've seen the movie, it's more or less the first book with some minor differences. In the book, there are 3 bears, not one. The opossum is there but has no babies. The fox is not as prominent but there is a squirrel instead. That kind of thing.

1 and 2 are perfect in every way, some people will consider the 3rd to be a bit preachy.