Stuff i read this week
Quality Assurance in Another World Vol. 2
Still incredible isekai storytelling. In this volume, protag-kun solves a problem by punching a treasure chest REAL hard a LOT of times and then standing on the lid and opening it, exploiting a physics glitch to make it catapult through the sky, like a messed up breath of the wild or something 11/10.
In case you missed it last time, this is the story of a QA tester getting stuck in some unspecified vr VIDEOGAME world, and just rolling with it and doing his goddamned job and testing the heck out of everything. If there's a hole in a wall's collision geometry he WILL find it and report it. Its a great take on the whole sword art online premise but actually good.
The Girl I Saved on the Train Turned Out to be my Childhood Friend Vol. 2 - 3
As I finished typing up my notes for last week on Monday I was like… volume 2 can’t be any worse… can it? You know what, I think the author of this series is actually and idiot.
Anyways...
- Why am I doing this to myself?
- we have spent SO MANY PAGES establishing how protag-kun is a fucking loser who sucks at dealing with people, whose only redeeming quality is that “he’s kinda nice and thoughtful sometimes”, but he mostly kinda sucks- I REFUSE TO BELIEVE HE IS CAPIBLE OF HAVING AN EX-GIRLFRIEND. it’s the most UNBELIEVABLE bit of character development this is stupid, and making that the driver behind the next 200 pages of BAD DRAMA is so unearned. this book is dumb
- i hate EVERYTHING ABOUT THIS BOOK
- i shall continue to pick up new volumes because I HATE MYSELF and i cant imagine it gets any worse, but i just have this feeling DEEP in my bones that its gunna disappoint me anyways
Wolf Girl and Black Prince Vol. 1
Ughhh this is also farrr too straight. I’ve made mistakes this week. Seems like we’re doing the whole aloof kinda twisted awful guy to loving perfect boyfriend gap mow pipeline thing- and you know what it fucking sucks. Every character in this sucks and is just incredibly toxic. I had to put the book down SO many times as it was making me mad how toxic it was lol. Do straight girls really like this shit?!? Absolutely awful, at least it doesn't have the gross leering gaze thing going on that "the girl i saved on the train" had going on... but somehow.. idk maybe this book is worse than that? idk... i did not have a good time.
Anyways I had a terrible time with it and I WILL BE BUYING MORE as it comes out because apparently, I hate myself
The Abandoned Empress Vol. 5
LETS GOOO finally, some flavour. This book gets better and better as the volumes go on. It does a real real good job of actually showing these characters grow up and becoming adults. Aristia for sure has a bunch of weirdo hot young men in her harem trying to plot their way into her affection- so it’s actually incredibly cool to see her mostly ambivalent reactions towards them in this volume- she’s focused on herself and survival and for that’s just real fun to read. Art is still really pretty, it’s a good book and you’ll have a good time I promise.
Yuri Espoir Vol. 1
There’s a characterisation reveal in the second chapter (well chapter 1 part 2- weird numbering) that’s just incredibly executed- the panel layout leading up to it is so good, there’s a tiny bit of foreshadowing in the first chapter but it’s just waaay more intense that you can guess, and then the book luxuriates in it for another 4 perfectly laid our pages. Worth reading just for that imo - an incredible bit of manga. Still blows my mind that Tokyopop somehow managed to survive into the 2020's and put out some actual great books. how did they manage that turn around?
Multi Mind Mayhem: Isekai Tensei Soudouki Vol. 1
This is the kind of isekai fantasy manga that has a page of character bios and portraits on the very first page of the book, like in volume one. One of the portrait boxes is slightly bigger than all the rest and is labelled “protagonist”. Its that kind of book. I just think that speaks to the confidence they have in how memorable and unique their character designs are.
That said on the same character roster page there’s a character called “Maggot” who is apparently protago-kuns mother? And a Nobel? And an adventurer? That’s stupid and i love it.
Anyways protag-kun seems to have TWO reincarnated souls stuck in his brain, a samurai and uhh, high school nerd who LOVES to read Wikipedia? Specifically actually literally textually Wikipedia. Guess that’s a superpower. If these nerds invert crop rotation I’ll scream.
(41 pages in) OH NO there’s a field… they are GROWING crops…
OH THANK HECK HES JUST INVENTING BEET SUGAR TO TAKE ON THE CANE SUGAR MONOPOLY AND MAKE A LOT OF MONEY SO THE BEAST LADY THAT WORKS AT THE TRADING GUILD WILL LET HIM PET HER DOG EARS OKAY THIS IS PRETTY GOOD
ACTUALLY, so I’ll end my real-time notes here. recommended if you are a genre pervert.
EDIT: MAYONNAISE?!? HE INVENTS MAYONNAISE?!? OF COURSE HE FUCKING INVENTS FUCKING MAYONNAISE. FUCK.
Bonus: Audiobooks
So I'm a spider, So what? Vol. 6
I've always liked this book, but now were on new material that wasn't in the anime it's EVEN better. this volume is getting SO good at the whole dramatic irony thing - we keep seeing stuff from White's perspective and then later seeing other characters react and monologue about stuff, with their imperfect understanding of the situation. its incredible how unknowable White is to everyone else, her motivations are just a total inscrutable mystery to everyone else, its great (her motivations are that shes a fucking idiot 10/10 no notes)
stuff in the pile for next week
lol Citrus... its just SO far down on my pile.. like physically.. it would be SO much work to get to volume 1... but i wanna..... Will Lotte EVER reread Citrus? find out next week
Books read this year: 236
Last weeks post
https://cohost.org/LotteMakesStuff/post/1987402-july-3rd-9th