#46. Oh Japan and Your Shoddy Novels

Before I begin, almost all links on this particular post is either in Japanese or related to Japanese materials. If you ever clicked any of them and are lost in translation, trust me, you are completely normal.

I must confess, I am not a fan of so-called Japanese light novels. I don't read them on a regular basis, I only have like four books in my bookshelf and is starting to regret ever buying those. It's just not my thing.

Now, normally I won't whine on things I don't care at all, but these days I had some curiosity on what the hell is going on all those Japanese light novel market. Of course there's another world this, another world that, a truck runs over you and you reincarnate in (take a wild guess) another world, that all just happened. I read through the very same theme when I was like fifteen, so it was actually a surprise to me. I thought that thing was all past things. (What didn't surprise me was the titles, which are now almost always one or more sentences. With ten words or more. I miss the good ol' single-to-double word titles.)

But seriously, recently things get way too much. Last summer I saw some bloke wrote what he thought was clever but was stupid was hell, something like what, 300 normal soldiers going on a siege against 5,000 demonic warriors? And he called it "a genius tactic?" Anyone with the slightest idea of Lanchester's square law will see how unrealistic and stupid this is, seriously. I took a look at what the hell was going on and had to scrub my eyeballs to get rid of what I just witnessed.

And there's this, what was the title again? Second Life in Another World or something. That thing was going to be anime'd but actually cancelled? Because the work has a protagonist who massacred thousands of Chinese in the war, and the author tweeted something chauvinistic? I know Japan is all messed up as of these days, but if a chauvinistic half-writer can be a million-selling author, I think almost all hopes are lost. (Amateur Tip, because I am not a professional writer: Perhaps it's best not to cause international controversy based on your so-called patriotism, which, as Samuel Johnson has said, is "the last refuge of a scoundrel.")

So that got my attentions at last. Recently I made an account on Syosetsuka Ni Narou, probably the biggest online novel site in Japan. I took some look at the recent hits, and had to scrub my eyeballs off to get rid of what I just witnessed. (Good thing I had some leftover bleaches from previous incident.) I mean, I'm no writer myself, just a generic weeaboo/gamer hybrid with some taste at fantasy genre, and I'm not even a native Japanese speaker/writer/reader/whatever, but hell, I can write a masterpiece if my future competitions are all... these. No, seriously. Japanese media was one of my greatest fascination when I was young, but these days, they keep disappointing me. All the wonders they showed me with Jojo's Bizarre Adventure (yes, this is a Jojo reference), Hellsing, Cowboy Bebop, Shin Megami Tensei, everything... It's not there. Not at least in this so-called Narou-kei novels. It's just sad to have this feeling that you finally get to meet your childhood idol and find him/her all fat, old, lazy, and uninteresting. That's how I feel now.

If they can do it, I can. If I actually do it, then it's the end of Japanese subculture literature. End transmission.