[Review] "The Final Reconciliation", by Todd Keisling (2017)

[honigfrosch]

(cross-posted from my journal in full)

In my previous review I mentioned that I read three horror books this year that dealt with occult music, and that they all disappointed me. This novella was number three. Not only was it not that good, it downright pissed me off.

( What the backcover blurb says )

I was willing to be totally sold on this. Instead I got a misogynist, repetitive mess full of clichéd writing.

Warning: I am going to spoil the shit out of this book that you will not want to read after I'm done. My deepest insincere apologies. By the way, some of the quotes are totally Not Safe For Work. And there is mention of sexual assault.

( 1,278 words of relatively unstructured vitriol )

[Review] Lout of Count's Family, Vol. 1 by Yu Ryeo-Han

[quillpunk]

Title Lout of Count's Family, Vol. 1
Author: Yu Ryeo-Han
Genre: Fantasy
Review: So back before the translation left Wuxiaworld, I read something like 600 chapters of this novel; the most I've ever read of any webnovel. I really liked it! But once the translation left I didn't keep up with it, and I haven't read it in years. But then Seven Seas published it? And I kind of regret that I got it as an ebook now, because I adore this so much and I want it on my physical shelf but I'm not sure how to justify that when I've already got it. Decisions, decisions.

Anyway, Lout of Count's Family (I'm never going to get used to the new title, LOL) is a korean webnovel in which an ordinary man who just wants to live a simple, lazy life is transmigrated into a lout of a count's son in a fantasy novel.  Luckily, he's read the first five volumes of the novel! Unlucky, doom and despair awaits as the continent will descend into war, and the Real Protagonist will, On The Road To Becoming a Hero run across Cale Henituse, the count's lout of a son. And things don't go that great for Cale, then. Ouch.

So in order to prevent this, Kim Roksu, now Cale, decides to skip passed all the fighting and just drag the protagonist to his future side-kicks so they can set out on their adventure and leave him alone.

Somehow things don't turn out that way. Wonder why. Could it... possibly.. have to do with the fact that Cale keeps saving people? No. No, that can't be why. I'm sure it's just... the natural... wings of a butterfly... and all that...

Hahhahah. Cale didn't do this to himself, did he?

No. Of course not. Haha. Ha.

Anyway, so yeah it's all Cale's fault that things then go way off the rails. Things escalate. They escalate so much. Not in the first volume! (Although things certainly get set in motion.) But things will escalate so much, it's hilarious.

I love this novel. I love all the characters. I love the dichotomy of the way the other characters view Cale and his actions vs. what Cale thinks and why he's doing what he's doing. I think the first volume sets up a lot of relationships and misunderstandings and worldbuilding, and I find the development of the various relationships to be lovely. There's so much friendship going around and so many different dynamics, which is really fun (and also scheming. I like the scheming, too.) 

I can't wait for more to be released. I am gritting my teeth against the urge to buy both ebooks + paperbacks. Sigh. My poor budget.