Moving On with March Catchups!
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Sick of winter yet? Ready for spring cleaning? Check out these catchup series as you count down the days until spring!
The anime season is wrapping up, so we've got one last hurrah until we start seeing new shows! Read the Endo and Kobayashi Live! The Latest on Tsundere Villainess Lieselotte duology before the anime finishes, or compare notes after it's over! When high schooler Endo agrees to play Kobayashi's favorite otome game with her, they discover that the characters in the game can hear them somehow! Can they help Prince Siegwald save the tragic Lieselotte, who dies in every route, with this unique opportunity? We recently started streaming the manga as well, so check it out! And did you enjoy Inglis's battle-junkie hijinks in Reborn to Master the Blade: From Hero-King to Extraordinary Squire ♀? Read the manga to experience the action and humor again, of a wise king reborn as a young girl who just wants to hone her combat skill in her new life!
If you're looking for something else to try, how about these series? Altina the Sword Princess is a low fantasy war chronicle starring a spunky, preternaturally strong princess and her bookworm of a strategist as they navigate a medieval world just about to enter the gunpowder age. The White Cat's Revenge as Plotted from the Dragon King's Lap stars Ruri, a girl abandoned by her best friend in another world. She stumbles upon the ability to transform into a cat and ends up in the Nation of the Dragon King, so naturally, it's time to plot her revenge!
For some shorter options, read about a young boy and his elven companion as they journey through an abandoned world in Goodbye Otherworld, See You Tomorrow, or about a class of knights-in-training who must learn the old ways from an ancient warrior in Magic Knight of the Old Ways.
J-Novel Club members can distract themselves with these 30+ volumes of content as they get through the month of March!
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Pinned by
myskaros
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Anyone who enjoys tactics, strategy games, or sword fights should check out Altina, I believe it to be the author's better and more original work
I wait impatiently for the next volume
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Wow… I think that this is the first time that I’ve already read nearly all of the catch-ups.
I’ve really enjoyed Altina (when’s the next book?!) and Endo & Kobayashi. Goodbye Otherworld was quite interesting and fairly different from other LNs that I’ve read. Reborn to Master the Blade has mostly been entertaining. Magic Knight was tolerable. I gave up on White Cat’s Revenge after the fourth book.
So far, though, I’ve only purchased aaaaaalllllllll of Endo & Kobayashi (two books so far here at JNC, but now there’s another book out there waiting for translation … but is it actually finished yet?), and the first volume of Altina. I’ll probably buy Goodbye Otherworld. I’m not sure about Reborn, and “nope” for the rest.
@Lily-Garden said in Moving On with March Catchups!:
Anyone who enjoys tactics, strategy games, or sword fights should check out Altina, I believe it to be the author's better and more original work
Lots of battles in no-it’s-not-Europe-not-at-all. :)
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I can totally recommend Goodbye Otherworld, it's really got that elegiac feel to it, if you like that sort of thing. I guess Reborn to Master the Blade is my guilty pleasure, though, because I'm up-to-date with the LN and having lots of fun with the anime.
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Wow, usually there isn't so much I'm interested in reading on Catch-up, but sweet.
The manga has me hooked, so looking forward to Endo and Kobayashi. I've been enjoying Mythical Hero, and everyone kept comparing it to a budget Altina, so I plan to try and read that too. Magic Knight sounds fun too, so I plan to check it out as well. Plus Reborn will be a quick read for the manga.
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Just sticking my head in to second or third or whatever count it is for the Altina recommendation. It's an amazingly good series with possibly the smartest protagonist of any J-novel series lead it. And most physically inept.
And yes, I'm counting Myne in that list, for both positions 😁
It somehow balances fighting, politics, and even a little romance in a wonderfully believable way.
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I was hoping that a series on my to read list would appear and Altina the Sword Princess fulfilled my wish!
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Altina is excellent. Several of the things in my sig are references to it.
Endo & Kobayashi Live! It was a very good match for my sense of humor.
The White Cat's Revenge. I haven't officially dropped it, but I'm also on indefinite hold? You have to be in the proper mind frame to deal with it; there's some dumb moments, as well as some world building that results in behaviors on the part of the main love interest that I find hard to stomach.
Goodbye Otherworld... This is a work of Pastoral Fantasy/Science Fiction, and very very well done. If Pastoral ain't your thing, you'll drop it pretty fast. If it is...it's delightful.All your libraries are belong to us. | Aub Rozemyne | Those who do not read shall not eat.
Help me, Satomi-san. You're my only hope. | Fight! Yurika! | WW[R|S]D
Croquettes, Baguettes, and Books, oh my! -
@Geezer-Weasalopes
i thought regis lives was a frodo baggins reference(I'm aware it's both, I just had to make the joke)Endo & Kobayashi is great, I agree.
My grasp on sanity remains absolute.
Oh, right, the poison, the poison for Kuzco, the poison chosen especially to kill Kuzco, Kuzco's poison. ...That poison?
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@TheGrimLich said in Moving On with March Catchups!:
@Geezer-Weasalopes I thought Regis lives was a Frodo Baggins reference (I'm aware it's both, I just had to make the joke)
Coming across someone who is aware of where I grabbed that from is refreshing.
While I read The Hobbit in fifth grade (~1970), it was a while longer until I made it through The Lord of the Rings. Probably 1972?
By then you could get a paperback edition with a letter to the readers from J.R.R himself on the back; there were still a number of copies of the Ace edition to be had at the used book stores.
I read the hardcover copies from the local library.
Big foldout maps! -
@Geezer-Weasalopes said in Moving On with March Catchups!:
The White Cat's Revenge. I haven't officially dropped it, but I'm also on indefinite hold? You have to be in the proper mind frame to deal with it; there's some dumb moments, as well as some world building that results in behaviors on the part of the main love interest that I find hard to stomach.
A deeply possessive love interest that I find more creepy than romantic, and one side character whose actions made no sense to me. Volume 1 was great fun, but by 4-5 I stopped enjoying it and I skipped the last 2.
Goodbye Otherworld... This is a work of Pastoral Fantasy/Science Fiction, and very very well done. If Pastoral ain't your thing, you'll drop it pretty fast. If it is...it's delightful.
Definitely. It and Side Character are two of the best "sad Keanu" series that I'd love to read more of, and this one has a good stopping point.
I need to give Altina another try. The plot in volume 1 was reminding me too much of an anime that I can't recall the name of with a similar tactician male MC in a war setting but it probably diverges more later on.
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I am enjoying my time with Altina quite a bit. I thought that I wouldn't like V3 as much as it focuses on politics more than battle tactics. I felt it was well done. Someone mentioned that the series balances Battles, Politics, and Romance very well and the more I read the more I understand that to be true.
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I do like tactics and strategy, but, though it's been a relatively long time now (I don't think there were anywhere near 14 volumes back then), I seem to recall Altina's protagonist's incredible negative self esteem putting a real damper on my enjoyment of what little I read of it. What do its fans think about that point?
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His self esteem being low is a familiar trope, but part of the payoff is knowing how untrue that is. There is the additional dimension concerning the responsibility for the life and death of his comrades to consider, which is more than the self esteem factor in my opinion. We tend to focus on elements we do not like but there are so many to like about Regis and balances out his character. He is loyal, intelligent, & courageous all things that add to my enjoyment of the story.
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@geetop
so would you say that it doesn't bother you, or that the story is so good that it's still good in spite of it? or even, third option, that it's a positive factor -
@rkkn His low confidence is rooted in a reasonable cause and he does grow out of it.
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I think it is both 2 & 3. He is young and growing and experience is going to change him in both military confidence and I suspect romance.
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Altina Sword Princess:
Is Loose Thread worth reading (it seems to come in between two regular volumes). I am pushing to get the whole series read so focusing on the main volumes. So far I have read V2 -7, working on V8., Thinking try to get to 14 first and then maybe read this standalone/prequel (not sure what Loose Thread is actually)
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@geetop it's sort of a prequel, it contains three short stories, the first on how Altina came to know of Regis, the second on Eddie and how the relationship between him and his royal charge came about and the third one is the most important as contains certain drastic events to cause an evolution of Bastian the 3rd prince.
Whether it's worth reading, I personally think it is as the last story informs character motivation and some events that happen from V8 onwards, but if you are really crunched for time then you could just read the third story in Loose Threads and come back to the other two later
“There’s always a story. It’s all stories, really. The sun coming up every day is a story. Everything’s got a story in it. Change the story, change the world.” ― Terry Pratchett, A Hat Full of Sky
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@Lily-Garden said in Moving On with March Catchups!:
if you are really crunched for time then you could just read the third story in Loose Threads and come back to the other two later
Thanks! I will see if I can squeeze the third short story into my schedule and return to the other two when I complete the series.
