Light Novels Completed So Far

i have nothing better to do, so i guess i will just make a short post on the light novels i have finished reading so far, since i started reading them about 2 years ago.

since i am not remotely proficent in japanese, i read the translated version, in traditional chinese. i don't trust the english translation, the latest example you can see from what they did with wolf and spice (those english people decided to call it spice and wolf). a little complaint here: if they can do so much as to change the cover art into that, despite protests, because they think it is good for the audience, i have no doubts that for the good of the audience they will change the meaning of the original texts into something that will be totally and absolutely irrelevant beneficial for the readers.

this is the list i have read so far:

suzumiya haruhi series (9 volumes)
kara no kyoukai (2 volumes, completed)
kaze no stigma (5 volumes)

well on and off ever since i started reading light novels, i would stop and turn back to manga, or read manga with light novels concurrently. as you can see, 2 years reading 16 books isn't all that outstanding.

i bought the haruhi series 2.5 years ago, read 2 volumes, then stopped to read the 2 volumes of kara no kyoukai, which was already completed. then i went on to read another 3 volumes of haruhi, and stopping again to read 5 volumes of kaze no stigma, then the rest of the 4 volumes again. yeapx, when i bought it 2 years ago, i bought 9 volumes at one go.

haruhi series, volume 9, had its last release on 1 april 2007. no it's not april fool. well 2 years later, the 10th volume is still not out yet, which leaves many fans disappointed. because to all readers of the light novels, we all know that the end of volume 9 left everything at a cliffhanger, with the haruhi side and the sasaki side clashing. actually i kind of like sasaki. hahaha.

kaze no stigma, a little disappointing to me. nothing wrong with the story, except for the fact that the loss of kazuma to ayano in their battle at volume 5 was rather... lame in my opinion. what i found disappointing was that the story will never be complete. i have only read until volume 5, which was the latest book kadokawa had translated when i bought the set. it seemed that during these few months they had already translated 2 more short story compilations. why they did not translate main volume 6, i don't know. anyway, it left readers with many question marks as to kazuma's history, including the half-concluded part of tsuoi rin, as of volume 5. 11 volumes, consisting of 6 main volumes and 5 short story compilations. certain pasts of kazuma were made known in the short story compilations though, like his relationship with li lon-yue. but this story will always remain incomplete, since the author of this series passed away on 20th july 2009, which was a few months ago. yeapx, this was a disappointment which no one could do anything about it. a fantastic story though, i would wish that it could come to completion. but as it is now, this story had broken off just like that. well, at least i had a good time reading that few volumes.

that made me think of trinity blood. i had wanted to buy the trinity blood novels at first, but the author had died while the series was still incomplete, and his friend had came in to finish the series. well, personally i don't know if the whole story followed the plot meant by the author. as an author myself (yeah i am just an unknown.. hahahaha), i would have already planned out the whole story, decided its ending and everything while writing. but the thing is i don't know if the continuation of the story was followed faithfully by his friend, assuming that he did indeed leave behind his notes, which his friends were given access to. so, because of that, i did not buy the series, which had sparked my interests when i saw the anime. i don't want to see an ending that was off. you see, everyone would know, the head and the middle has to match the ending, which was the 'perfect ending' came up by the author. everything has to be in harmony and synchronized. if you only has the head and half of the body, it is kind of hard to come up with a 'perfect ending' for which the published series existed to support it.

kara no kyoukai... well i must admit, one of the best i have read so far, given all the books that i had read, including english books. a dark story, with very few yet developed characters, and a good story plot. for those who don't mind dark stories where you deal with split and twisted personalities, gore(?) and murder, this book is definitely a recommended one. oh, i forgot to mention. basically every single character in each of the individual chapters has at least one single tragic character with a tragic end. satsuki, tomoe, fujino are some of the examples. typical of nasu's works, tsukihime, fate stay night and kara no kyoukai, all of them have one thing in common. tragic characters with tragic ends. that's why nasu is my favorite author.

so i am off to read my next series, zero no tsukaima. hopefully i will be able to complete them soon, and move on to other series. i have a lot i want to read, such as wolf and spice (definitely not going to buy the lousy english version), shakugan no shana, fullmetal panic and many many others.

oh yea, if you are interested in what was the change of wolf and spice, continue to scroll down to see it. don't westernize every single thing on earth. what the hell. any japanese literate people would know the original cover wrote wolf and spice, and any english literate people would know their version of the cover wrote spice and wolf. the title being not much of an issue, the cover perhaps created a much more racket.

original:

english version:

someone tell me, is the above picture a guy with long hair and slender body, or a flat-chested woman? i have no offence to flat-chested woman, i am just curious about the picture. you see, horo (or rather, holo, in the english version) is a 600 year old fox deity, not some vampire or werewolf in underworld.