Hate on what you Love. Let's air our grievances.
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Lot of responses here. I think I might have misspoken by mentioning "raunchy" covers. While overtly sexualized underaged girls is a problem for me, it's nearly as bad even if the girls are just the primary focus of the cover.
Look at it this way. If I had one or two racy covers in my library then this could be dismissed as an anomaly - maybe I just picked them up in a garage sale assortment or something. But if I have shelf, after shelf, after shelf filled with completed series of carefully sorted volumes that prominently display underaged girls - even if tastefully - people are going to start looking at me funny. After a while, the pattern becomes so clear that it stops mattering whether the covers are technically "raunchy". You might think this is an ironic concern given that my eBook collection actually does contain such volumes, but in my defense these elements are something I tolerate rather than enjoy.
By contrast, a series like Bookworm is less problematic because there are enough additional background elements that the protagonist isn't the sole focus of the art, and although she's prominently displayed she isn't obviously being "posed".
@kuali said in Hate on what you Love. Let's air our grievances.:
Hmm... Looking down the volumes in my subscribed series list, there's actually not a lot in the way of raunchy covers.
It's very possible that you have better tastes than me. Just going through my eBook collection: Altina, Arch Demon's Dilemma, Arifureta, I'm a Behemoth, Bofuri, Classroom of the Elite, Demon Lord Retry, Demon Slayer, Didn't I Say To Make My Abilities Average, Gabriel Dropout, Goblin Slayer - and that's just alphabetically up to "G" - all have at least a few covers that I would not be comfortable displaying in my home.
I might have unintentionally exaggerated when I said "signficant majority", but it's at least common enough that there are plenty of examples.
@folker46 said in Hate on what you Love. Let's air our grievances.:
Marvel and DC comics are guilt of the same thing so it's not just the Japanese who are guilty of "spicing up" the cover art.
Fair enough. FWIW, I also don't purchase or read western comics.
I dunno. Given my limited exposure I'm on shaky ground here. My impression is that the women - despite all the problems you mention above - are not so obviously underage, and they often share the cover with equally stylized male characters. Somehow, a middle-aged man owning a bunch of DC or Marvel comics comes off as juvenile rather than as creepy. But this may just be my own bias.
@kalani said in Hate on what you Love. Let's air our grievances.:
80s romances though are notorious for horrible covers as well. (and 90s ones aren't much better)
Good point. 80s romance comes off as very low-brow, but the actors are not underaged, and the focus is as much (or more so) on the male lead as on the female lead. I would be embarrassed to have a library filled with romance novels but for a completely different reason.
I, too, would be willing to display the Apothecary Diaries books in my library.
@salientmind said in Hate on what you Love. Let's air our grievances.:
So do romance books and harlequin. It might not be an exclusive problem, but it doesn't change the fact its a problem.
Fair point. None of these books would be in my library. I suppose the only thing that makes JPN LNs different is that I actually enjoy reading them and actively seek them out.
@poisonedbite said in Hate on what you Love. Let's air our grievances.:
I literally have a naked Rias Gremory on a stripper pole figure in my office ;)
Geez. That would be a hard "no" for me. I think it might even lead to a divorce.
@waterdweller said in Hate on what you Love. Let's air our grievances.:
My solution to this, besides avoiding the worst offenders, is keeping my entire light novel collection hidden away in my bedroom, reserving the bookcase in my living room for "serious" books (which, granted, is a luxury not available to everyone).
Unfortunately (or maybe fortunately, because there is no temptation) with a wife and child in the house, there's no such thing as a private space where I can collect such material. I suppose my eReader is the sole private space left to me.
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@unknownmat For the record, I was just talking about my subscriptions list on j-novel club. There are some more... dubious... covers in my wider ebook collection - including some of the ones you mentioned (specifically Bofuri, Average Abilities and Gabriel Dropout). And no, I wouldn't really want to fill a bookshelf with those (even if I was inclined to get a bookshelf).
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This discussion about the acceptability of light novel covers has got me thinking that perhaps I should just buy whatever series I want to without even giving covers more than the briefest of considerations, as the people who are liable to judge me for it would probably judge me regardless of how carefully I select my light novels (or manga).
And anyway, it's unlikely that I'll ever show my collection to anyone who isn't already into the "trinity" of Japanese media (anime/manga/light novels), and who as a group would probably either be accepting, or at the very least understanding of the issue with all the unfortunate cover art.
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@kuali Weird. Bofuri covers don't even proc my concerns, they seem fairly ordinary to me. It's such a weird thing to see how much my opinion of problematic covers can differ from others, because I do agree with most of those other series listed.
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With all the discussion about physical releases and their covers, I've thought of another grievance, mostly against a certain publisher: too little text per page, making volumes way thicker and heftier than they need to be. Even if I want to start collecting more series, I'm really starting to hit the point where I'll run out of shelf space just by continuing to collect my current series. If every publisher could fill the pages with text the way j-novel does, I could probably fit 50% more volumes in the one bookcase I've reserved for light novels.
For illustrative purposes:
Guess which volume has the higher word count.
The answer: Ascendance of a Bookworm - 84k words, Reincarnated as a Sword - 79k words. It's ridiculous.
(Back when I bought my first light novel volume, I did so with the intention of stopping once I had filled one smallish bookcase (80cm wide, with 6-7 shelves, three-and-a-half of which have been filled so far). If I want to stick to that, I really can't start collecting any new series. Moreover, finding room for another bookcase in an out of view place would be a pain in the rear. Having more compact volumes would be a big help.)
Edited to add an illustrative photo, and again to add the math:
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@georgemto
I was just thinking that. They're literally wearing, like, armor. well, book 4 has the twins hugging, but they're fully covered. -
@poisonedbite / @GeorgeMTO So, when I mentioned Bofuri, this is what I was responding to:
@unknownmat said in Hate on what you Love. Let's air our grievances.:
Lot of responses here. I think I might have misspoken by mentioning "raunchy" covers. While overtly sexualized underaged girls is a problem for me, it's nearly as bad even if the girls are just the primary focus of the cover.
Look at it this way. If I had one or two racy covers in my library then this could be dismissed as an anomaly - maybe I just picked them up in a garage sale assortment or something. But if I have shelf, after shelf, after shelf filled with completed series of carefully sorted volumes that prominently display underaged girls - even if tastefully - people are going to start looking at me funny. After a while, the pattern becomes so clear that it stops mattering whether the covers are technically "raunchy". You might think this is an ironic concern given that my eBook collection actually does contain such volumes, but in my defense these elements are something I tolerate rather than enjoy.
Bofuri may be relatively tasteful with how it displays its stars, but it is still a bunch of 'young female' covers.
Incidentally, to add to the list of things that annoy people: Have you seen the armor they use? In medieval times, you wouldn't walk into battle in plate armor deliberately made to expose your upper arms and upper legs. That's basically saying to the enemy "I have too many limbs! Why don't you relieve me of one?" Or lighter armor that has 'tasteful' cutaways on the sides of the torso to show off how toned your abdomen is ("Why yes, sir, I do have too many kidneys! Help yourself!").
This is hardly a Japan-exclusive issue, of course, but it does still irritate me when you see sets of armor (even in video games) that are so clearly designed as costumes rather than armor. Honestly, I'm happier to see people walking around in regular clothing saying that they're protected by their character level or strengthening magic or something...
https://forums.j-novel.club/topic/6701/omnibus-builder
https://forums.j-novel.club/topic/5745/ascendance-of-a-bookworm-omnibus-editionsThe Primal Desires: Food, Sleep, Sex, StroZero, Hypnotism, and Awayuki Kokorone.
Item Diaria Apothecaria legi debent.
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@folker46 Personally, I really like when series with a rather op MC do that (The girl who ate a death god, is another example). Because it let us know that despite how powerful those characters are, defeat is coming, which help keep the tension hight.
Obviously it's a problem if those future parts starts spoiling the plot, but as long as it stays vague enough on the MC whereabouts and how major events unfolded it's fine. -
I guess I just don't see the problem with having the characters on the cover. Unless they're like, loli's. I don't judge sao for having kirito on the front. I judge it for a lot of things, but not that.
And it's well known that bikini armor gets more effective the smaller it is. That's just basic magic.
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@poisonedbite Take that up with @unknownmat, they're his criteria!
And as we found out in Sexiled, that thing about showing more skin helping with the magic was actually a lie! Turns out the guy in charge just wanted to make women wear degrading outfits, go figure...
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@poisonedbite No worries. You're welcome to collect based on whatever criteria makes sense to you.
@kuali Thanks for providing the context of my remarks. You had indeed responded in the spirit that I had intended.FWIW, let me just give one example of the kind of awkward interaction I'd be afraid of given room full of even "tasteful" images of young 2-D girls.
I have a daughter who is on the cusp of entering middle-school. I can just imagine one of her friend's parents getting a good look at something like this while dropping their kid off at our house:
(NOTE: Just a random image from the internet).In that case, do I say nothing and just hope they understand and appreciate anime subculture? Somehow, preemptively defending myself seems even worse: "Oh! I just read light novels for the plot. It's not at all like I have an unhealthy obsession with young girls or anything. Don't worry! You're daughter will be completely safe at our house. Really! See you at six. Goodbye."
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@raitoiro said in Hate on what you Love. Let's air our grievances.:
Personally, I really like when series with a rather op MC do that (The girl who ate a death god, is another example). Because it let us know that despite how powerful those characters are, defeat is coming, which help keep the tension hight.
I didn't respond to @Folker46 because I took them to be specifically focused on Tanya the Evil. But I agree that revealing the outcome ahead of time can be a useful story mechanic when used well. Another example that comes to mind is The Boondock Saints where this technique is used to turn an otherwise suspenseful action scenes (Two people vs. all those trained killers, will they be OK?) into humorous a one ("Stupid fucking rope.").
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@unknownmat grin As I said, those flash-forwards are a real dramatic-tension-killer. But hey, if you want your tension killed...
https://forums.j-novel.club/topic/6701/omnibus-builder
https://forums.j-novel.club/topic/5745/ascendance-of-a-bookworm-omnibus-editionsThe Primal Desires: Food, Sleep, Sex, StroZero, Hypnotism, and Awayuki Kokorone.
Item Diaria Apothecaria legi debent.
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@waterdweller I will say that I like thicker because the type is bigger and easier to read, it's one of my irritations with LN is they use such a small font I can hardly read it unless it's on an e-reader. Tanya the Evil does that. Yep, getting old sucks.
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@kuali Diablo in How not to summon a Demon Lord complains about that too, he wants to give better armor to his "harem" but hates that the higher the level is the more skin it shows. Also, why does everyone wear leather armor instead of chainmail? Leather armor can be made to look good but in a real fight it's worthless most of the time. Chainmail wasn't that expensive, provided good protection, and could be repaired while leather was a one use item. I blame D&D for people thinking leather armor is worth anything.
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@folker46 said in Hate on what you Love. Let's air our grievances.:
@waterdweller I will say that I like thicker because the type is bigger and easier to read, it's one of my irritations with LN is they use such a small font I can hardly read it unless it's on an e-reader. Tanya the Evil does that. Yep, getting old sucks.
That's another nice thing about an e-ink reader. A couple of taps and you've made the font as large as you want.
I get the fun of collecting physical novels, and I did that back when most books were only available in paper editions. I had bookshelves overflowing with more boxes of books in a bedroom closet.
Once you switch to ebooks though it's nice to be able to have hundreds of books taking up zero space.
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@unknownmat said in Hate on what you Love. Let's air our grievances.:
@poisonedbite No worries. You're welcome to collect based on whatever criteria makes sense to you.
@kuali Thanks for providing the context of my remarks. You had indeed responded in the spirit that I had intended.FWIW, let me just give one example of the kind of awkward interaction I'd be afraid of given room full of even "tasteful" images of young 2-D girls.
In that case, do I say nothing and just hope they understand and appreciate anime subculture? Somehow, preemptively defending myself seems even worse: "Oh! I just read light novels for the plot. It's not at all like I have an unhealthy obsession with young girls or anything. Don't worry! You're daughter will be completely safe at our house. Really! See you at six. Goodbye."
Ah, I see what the problem is. You think people will care, and you care what those people think. Trust me, no one is going to pull books off your shelf and judge you about the covers. Unless your family and friends are like, super religious or something. Which they might be given your aversion to something as completely unsexual as Bofuri. Books marketed to teens have teens on/in them. It's just japanese YA.
And, well, if someone does ask, that's when you convert them into a weeb too.
One of us. One of us. One of us.
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@poisonedbite said in Hate on what you Love. Let's air our grievances.:
Which they might be given your aversion to something as completely unsexual as Bofuri. Books marketed to teens have teens on/in them. It's just japanese YA.
It doesn't bother me, but the volume one cover has Maple in Bikini Heavy Armor as if that makes sense. I think you've become a little bit desensitized to fanservice ::)
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Let’s leave the best slight jab contest for another topic
(Which I will immediately lock)
Thank you
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@harmlessdave
Her armor is historically accurate, actually. The shield covers the thighs, cuisses aren't worn to improve mobility. It's also not a bikini, that's a tasset, and the skirt is her faulds. She's also not wearing pauldrons, but the great shield covers that too.
