The thing is, with how much time is invested in reading a light novel, not everyone may have read some of your picks. So for this week's Midweek discussions, I'll provide a dais where one can explain why their pick should win over someone else's.

ps.: Very few nominations so far. Myne says you should get your asses up and start nominating!

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[–] Mercuri@ani.social 3 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (1 children)

I also nominated my favorite series for (almost) everything where thought it applied: Reincarnated as a Sword, Failure Frame, & Trapped in a Dating Sim. Honestly I felt a little biased focusing on those three but hey, whatever. At the very least, let me try to justify a few of my claims.

For best art, I nominated KWKM (Failure Frame) and Llo (Reincarnated as a Sword). From all the light novels I have read, their art stands above the rest. The level of detail is striking and it often captures the specifics of the book as well. For instance, it's not uncommon for artists to keep the characters in the same outfits in every depiction. Or to have the art only loosely tie to the prose. Or have the art be more of a sketch than a full render. I don't feel that's the case with these two and it comes across like they're always giving 100%. Here are a couple examples.

KWKM:

spoiler

I love that it's not just a character on a plain background for this color insert, but really captures the whole scene. The dress is extravagant and the emotion on Seras' face is capture perfectly.

Llo:

spoiler

Llo's art style is, IMHO, extremely cute. Every depiction of Fran is both adorable and cool. They say you shouldn't judge a book by its cover but I got into Reincarnated as a Sword in part because Llo's amazing art captured my attention.

For best Duo, I just want to argue for my #1 pick: Fran and Teacher (Reincarnated as a Sword). Their relationship is the driving force of the whole series and in the latest volumes that hasn't changed. Their personalities are deep, the character development extensive, and despite being very different they mesh perfectly together and it never feels forced.

For best antagonist I'm also just going to argue my #1 pick: Goddess Vicius (Failure Frame). She was always an antagonist in the series but the volumes released this year really exposed the true extent of her depravity and maliciousness. Despite being a Goddess of unparalleled beauty, you end up loathing her entirely. I love that mismatch of traits.

[–] NineSwords@ani.social 3 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (2 children)

Well this is a campaign debate, so allow me:

my #1 pick: Goddess Vicius

I've only read up to and including volume 10 so I'm not up to date, but I found Viscious always to be very 1-dimensional evil. Like her entire personality is that she's evil but beautiful. She was so far only reactionary without any godly insight or forethought and for being a goddess she's honestly not very bright. She gets completely blindsided when someone who has all the reason in the world to hate her schemes against her and doesn't seem to have a personal motivation for what she does other than to fulfill her daily evil quota. Honestly if in one of the volumes later on it would turn out that she isn't a goddess at all and just a lazy otaku neet who only got reincarnated herself it would be more believable than trying to sell her as an all-powerful being. She is like Walter White trying to look all cool and in control but in reality is scared shitless and swept away by what's happening around her, desperately treading water to keep her from drowning. She is a caricature and a joke.

No, compare this with my, clearly far superior pick! I present you my candidate (cough actual former God chough) Erwärmen!. Not only has he a complete backstory that can fill an entire book itself, but his motivations are clearly defined. He isn't the antagonist because MC needs someone evil to fight against, he is the antagonist because his goals are reasonable and just but ultimately clash with the personal wants of Rozemyne. Like every great SSR-Tier antagonist before him (Prince Nuada and General Hummel) he is the hero of the story if you only shift the POV by a fraction of a degree.

That's, Bookworm and .. Lady Bookworm is what an Antagonist of the Year looks like!

I rest my case.

ps.: Fran & Teacher is a good pick. Granted, not Clarissa & Hartmut levels of good, but respectable nonetheless.

[–] Mercuri@ani.social 3 points 1 week ago (2 children)

Haha, I love this. BTW, you've totally convinced me to read Bookworm. I love the anime anyway but you talking about it makes me want to get more Myne/Rosemyne.

She gets completely blindsided when someone who has all the reason in the world to hate her schemes against her and doesn’t seem to have a personal motivation for what she does other than to fulfill her daily evil quota

And THAT is why I nominated Vicius for #1 villain this year! Because before she WAS one dimensional and seemed evil just for the sake of being evil and to foil the MC. However in Book 11 a lot of her machinations and motivations are revealed. And yes, she's still awful self-obsessed evil garbage but now you can see how all her plotting meshed together for her goals (yes, she has actual goals!). Granted, it's maybe not the most mind-blowing reveal ever but it was still a big leap for her character development.

No, compare this with my, clearly far superior pick!

How you worded this... perfection.

he is the hero of the story if you only shift the POV by a fraction of a degree.

Okay, I admit I like that. I think you might have convinced me.

ps.: Fran & Teacher is a good pick

Right?!

Granted, not Clarissa & Hartmut levels of good, but respectable nonetheless.

PPPSSSSSHHHHFFFFFFTTTT.... look, I'll read it, okay. I promise. But you'll never convince me Fran & Teacher aren't #1 ;)

[–] NineSwords@ani.social 3 points 1 week ago

BTW, you’ve totally convinced me to read Bookworm.

Only fair. I'll put Failure Frame back in my PTR list when Vicious gets some depth in vol 11.

[–] I2jgwh0hYtxrCZQ@lemmy.sdf.org 3 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

Granted, not Clarissa & Hartmut levels of good, but respectable nonetheless.

PPPSSSSSHHHHFFFFFFTTTT.... look, I'll read it, okay. I promise. But you'll never convince me Fran & Teacher aren't #1 ;)

Don’t read it for Clarissa & Hartmut they are small fry. The best duo is clearly Schwartz and Weiss. Don’t be swayed by their lies!

Vote Schwartz and Weiss for best duo!

^Advertisement Paid for by the S&W foundation^

[–] I2jgwh0hYtxrCZQ@lemmy.sdf.org 2 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (1 children)

I present you my candidate (cough actual former God chough) Erwärmen!.

Erwärmen Is not an antagonist!

There is clearly only 1 antagonist in Bookworm. The one and only Ferdinand!

He does nothing but pick fights, has many more pages than Erwärmen and has a deeper back story.

Ferdinand is always trying to pick a fight with my boy Erwärmen for no reason.

Don’t read - Bookworm Spoilers

refusing to listen and not getting his book filled
attacking him with poison
attacking him to protect Myne
insulting him
refusing to save the country
refusing to let the person who want to take over the country do it

Vote Ferdinand for Antagonist!

^Advertisement Paid for by Myne (Ferdinand’s No.1 victim^

[–] Myne@ani.social 3 points 1 week ago

^Advertisement Paid for by Myne (Ferdinand’s No.1 victim^

I'm Rozemyne of Ehrenfest and this is my favorite post in c/lightnovels.

[–] NineSwords@ani.social 3 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

As one might expect I nominated Ascendance of a Bookworm for (almost) everything but I would like to campaign for two of my additional picks in the Best Debut and Best Emotional Moment categories:

For Best Debut, I would like to tell you about "Zilbagias the Demon Prince: How the Seventh Prince Brought Down the Kingdom" which debuted in April. There have been 3 volumes so far and so far it does something special that I haven't really seen anywhere else.

The basic premise is that in the war between Humans and Demons, the Hero dies in a failed suicide mission to kill the Demon King and gets reincarnated as the Demon King's 7th son. With his old hero memories intact he vows to destroy the demons now from the inside. Where this series stands out is that with that "inside POV" both the hero and we as readers learn to like those demons. We learn about the demon's society and their motivations up o a point where I would be genuinely pissed if MC killed the demon king. There are some traditional dislikable villains as well in the form of some of his siblings for example, but so far there hasn't been much contact between them. We just see the MC's psyche get torn apart bit by bit by the dichotomy of his past and present life. I find this aspect really interesting. For example, he has to kill human prisoners of war as part of his royal training but internally he justifies this with an eye on the end goal. But as he comes to respect and even like some of the demons those sacrifices are putting a heavy burden on his soul. And it's starting to show. Frankly, MC is falling apart and the only thing holding him together is a devil residing in his soul that he contracted with as part of his demon upbringing. Those devils represent concepts and MC's sidekick represents "taboo". As such she is quite happy with someone whose every breath basically breaks some taboo but it's unclear so far whether she actually cares for MC or if she is just stringing him along.

As you can see there are quite some compelling ideas in this series and I haven't even started on the other side characters like a mind-broken high elf and the type of bloodline magic MC inherited. For a debut volume, I would argue that it is more than enough to win this award over the millionth otome villainess title.

For "Best Emotional Moment" I was torn between the end of Bookworm and the last chapter of Enough with This Slow Life! I Was Reincarnated as a High Elf and Now I’m Bored. Bookworm was sweet beyond words, but here I would like to campaign for Slow Life instead.

I try to keep it as spoiler-free as possible but it's impossible to write about it without giving at least some vague spoilers:

Last volume

As I wrote in the weekly threads several times already this particular series has an insane pace. It's the entire 1000-year lifespan of a high elf in just 8 volumes. The series excels in making the reader care for the characters MC meets during his life. And even though they're just a blip in the grand scale of his long lifespan it still stings when they ultimately pass away. That epilogue chapter was the passing of his oldest companion and lover, a look back on his life and everyone he met, and himself ultimately passing. Just writing about it now made me tear up a bit. It's really something to make me care so much for characters where there is so little time spent on in the form of the actual page count, but this series still managed it.