[Sushi-Y]

Originally Posted by Srin Tuar

ZnT volume 7 sucked me in and i was forced to read it in a marathon.

Volume 7 talk:

Spoiler:

Wow, crazy stuff.

Highlights:
*Ruziu and Saito fighting is depressing, but it keeps me flipping pages

*ジュリオ is a weird character. He seemed to flip-flop from gallant, to crass, then back to gallant. I dont know what he's all about, except that he seems to know way too much about everything. I wonder if he's not part of sheffield's secret team of king-maker/artifact collectiors or something.

Spoiler:

*The ressurected dragon knights were a surprise. i kept flipping pages waiting to find out they were cromwell's zombies... but it never happened. Had me wondering what the hell plot device that was the whole book.

*クロムウェル had his ticket punched badly this volume. Seeing him go from dominating kyomu-master to snivelling bootlicker in one fell swoop... wow.

*Anrietta: i still thing they should have finished her after she went berserk with zombie-wales. She has clearly lost her sanity. I knew as soon as she sent her fleet off to war she would be the death of her little country. Futher learning that the person she is after was never any more than a pawn.... makes her look dumber and dumber.

*Saito seems to be the only sane person sometimes. Honor is great and all, but I agree with him, there is no honor to be gained in a such a simply minded invasion like that... I thought the scene where ド・ポワチエ was shot while holding onto his back-patting trophy was fitting. This is the same army that gave an award to gisshu, whos only real accomplishment was not pissing himself while his experienced sargeant did all the thinking.

*シエスタ hrm, this poor girl is getting too desperate, its starting to make her seem unleasitic. i think a real girl would simply find somebody else. Saito turned down her offer of everything she was, and thats pretty damn insulting to a person. Sure, she was being a bit pushy, and when a girl gets so desperate like that it can be a turn-off. I can sortof understand why he refused her.... but at the same time he had just had a fight with ruizu and was just about to call it quits with her.... Perhaps she sensed that he might be vulnerable and gunned for that. But still, she has to let him make the first move. a woman who acts like the face-sucker from "Aliens" can be scary.

* The wedding was cute. I loved the way he had her knocked out... He was completely 冷静 though the whole "ceremony" and she was the one completly off-guard. Furthermore, I was suprised that he was willing to trust Julio. It makes him seem like a big man, though i was honestly worried about a drugged ruizu buing handed over to a guy like that....

*Saito's last stand. Its pretty cool, to go up one man vs an army. He finally got his groove back. I was expecting him to be captured, but instead we got to learn why the deus-ex-machina event in the beginning was planted there: to save saito's tail in the end.

Its long overdo, truely, its about time some elves got involved in the story. ive been hearing about them too long. someone is going to have to physically restrain me from volume 8...

Spoiler:

Lol, you're so mean to Henrietta and Siesta.

In my opinion, Henrietta is one of those characters who hits rock bottom doing shameful things and can't blame anyone but herself for it (kind of like her real life counterpart). From an observer's point of view though, you wish she would just stop sulking already and recover her former self.

The post-war period in volume 8 probably served as a rebound period for her. It appears she's finally ready to take the stage again in vol.9 as a serious competitor against Louise and Siesta (according to the preview).

As for Siesta, I already talked about her actions in vol.7 plenty here, so I won't mention them again.

All I can say is that this is just another personal preference thing, it's all down to how you attach meanings to her actions, be they favorable or unfavorable opinions.

Also, about those dragon knights, it's pretty clear that Miss Bust Revol- I mean Tiffania saved them, if you have noticed that she said "again?" in the epilogue when she found out that "another" injured person was down in the forest.

Originally Posted by Srin Tuar

If someone tells me that the suzumiya novels have some juicy bits and suprises that are lacking in the anime version, I'll definitely give volume 1 a look

For what the anime covered (vol.1 + random short stories from 3, 5, and 6), they did a really good job with it. In many cases, the anime was even better than the novel due to the excellent scripting as well as superb audiovisuals.

Nevertheless, the anime has only covered a part of the overall series. Vol.4 (Suzumiya Haruhi no Shoushitsu), in particular, is probably the favorite volume for most of the fans of the series. It was vol.4 that finally exploited the full potential of the novel's supernatural settings, as well as drawing out the core of the settings for our main characters (Haruhi, Yuki, Mikuru, etc.).

If you thought the anime's main story (vol.1, Suzumiya Haruhi no Yuutsu) was good, then you should definitely give vol.4 a read (while you're at it, vol.7 as well).

Originally Posted by Srin Tuar

Otherwise I'll contiune my research into what to read next very soon.

You're looking for a light novel to read? *eyes go kyupi---n*

How about Owari no Chronicle (終わりのクロニクル)?

Spoiler for intro:

If you want a story with a deep (and I mean deep) world view and heavy (and I mean heavy) background settings, this is it.

Kawakami Minoru-san is a very talented writer, with a very unique writing style. It may be a little hard to get used to his writings in the beginning, but once you catch on, it's a smooth and thrilling ride.

Owari no Chronicle itself looks like a SF story on the surface, but it's really a lot more than that (much like any great stories). Well, if you're interested, you can try looking it up (Amazon.co.jp have customer reviews, you can try there).

The series is also well known for it's thick volumes. Kawakami-san is the kind who never stops writing once he begins, hence the ridiculous book sizes.

There's a total of 7 volumes for the series, but don't be fooled into thinking "oh, that's less than Zero no Tsukaima!":

Spoiler for true "volume" of the series:

Number of volumes: 7
↓
But actually, it's more like:

Volume 1 (上)
Volume 1 (下)
Volume 2 (上)
Volume 2 (下)
Volume 3 (上)
Volume 3 (中)
Volume 3 (下)
Volume 4 (上)
Volume 4 (下)
Volume 5 (上)
Volume 5 (下)
Volume 6 (上)
Volume 6 (下)
Volume 7

So it's really 14 "volumes"
↓
On top of that, each volume is far larger than the average light novel (the page count for an average light novel volume is 250 - 300)

Volume 1 (上) (386 pages)
Volume 1 (下) (450 pages)
Volume 2 (上) (386 pages)
Volume 2 (下) (482 pages)
Volume 3 (上) (386 pages)
Volume 3 (中) (387 pages)
Volume 3 (下) (483 pages)
Volume 4 (上) (499 pages)
Volume 4 (下) (515 pages)
Volume 5 (上) (515 pages)
Volume 5 (下) (579 pages)
Volume 6 (上) (579 pages)
Volume 6 (下) (611 pages)
Volume 7 (1091 pages)

Yes, you read that right, 1091 pages,

Akiba Blog's Entry
You can most definitely kill someone by whacking them over the head with it.
It broke the record for being Dengeki Bunko's thickest light novel ever. That's Kawakami-san for you.
↓
Add the pages up, and you'll have 7349 pages.

Converted to regular light novel volume size (300~ pages), that's enough pages for 24.5 volumes.

I predict there will be an anime adaptation of this series in the future as well.

Here's a MAD movie made for the novel:
http://stage6.divx.com/members/66788/videos/2874