Eddie's Monthly

This month I continued my dive into Chronicles of Ancient Darkness, a series I read and loved as a kid:

Chroniques des Temps Obscurs: Les Mangeurs d'âmes – Michelle Paver

This one was pretty weak but it sets up a lot of background info and foundation for the rest of the series.

Chroniques des Temps Obscurs: Le Banni – Michelle Paver

This one was better than the previous one, there were more twists and turns in the story; the past three books had been unsatisfying straight forward

Chroniques des Temps Obscurs: Le Serment – Michelle Paver

This one goes even further in the twist and turns department and introduces us to another side of the forest as well as reveals a couple of things about our main character's past.

Chroniques des Temps Obscurs: Chasseur de fantômes – Michelle Paver

This last book is honestly great, it is a good ending to the saga, and a better book than its predecessors. Although not everything is explained in the end, it concludes in a satisfying manner. The whole universe is used well and we get more glimpses at the magic/mythic side of it.

Overall this series is really good for early to mid-teens (12-16yr olds), I like that it's “honest” in the way things are written; it doesn't take the reader for an idiot, which is sometimes the case for books aimed at younger readers. It also has a pretty expansive vocabulary; I knew the most words in my classroom in grade 6 thanks to it. Characters are coherent, the story is too, and so are the rules within the universe. The universe is also super rich and original, and I wish there was more time to be spent in it, perhaps with a more mature story. But I cannot fault the author for ending her series where she did; I respect that much more than someone who drags it on forever, way past the point where they still have something to say.

One Piece

Romance Dawn

Light work no reaction

Orange Town

Light work no reaction

Nami meh

**Syrup Village **

Light work no reaction

I hate Usopp

Baratie

Light work no reaction

Shit makes no sense

Arlong park

Oooouuu it's got a little kick [slowed and reverbed]

Up until this point, I was fully planning on abandoning the manga, as I didn't care for the characters or the story that much. It felt like more episodic stuff with random characters added in that you would never see again, and I hate when media just throws a ton of characters at you. This arc was a welcomed change, and in it I saw the potential for One Piece.

Loguetown

There were some cool characters introduced here, and it was nice seeing Buggy again. This is where I realised that you are supposed to read the one-page story at the beginning of each volume, which I did not do. Oops

Reverse Mountain

Honestly didn't really care for this arc, I wasn't intrigued by the bad guys™ introduced there

Whisky Peak

Same as previous one

Little Garden

I really liked the beginning of this arc, but I still find the enemies to be lacklustre. I think Luffy and his crew are just too OP for most of the antagonists thrown at them and it only makes for an interesting fight when one or more of them are incapacitated in a way or another.

Drum Island

[Not done with it yet — Chopper's alright]

One of my friends — Marco aka the best man at my wedding — had been hounding me forever to read One Piece (OP). It is in his opinion the best piece of media ever. I knew nothing about it. The only manga I had read semi-seriously was Berserk. He went on to read Berserk and then told me One Piece was still way ahead of Berserk. I could not stand such slander, I had had wind of how bad the OP anime was — filled with filler and overdrawn — and could not believe that OP could potentially rival Berserk, let alone “clear it”. During a drunken interaction I had told him I would read OP if I got a raise before he got his job; he was then in his third round of interviews, was recommended by his master's thesis supervisor who was buddy with the director of the department he was applying for, whereas I had been wounding my boss for a raise for since the beginning of the year and hadn't gotten anything but empty promises. Against all odds, I did get a raise before he got his job. So, a man of my word, I started reading One Piece, around June but never got into it. Both June and July were kept busy due to wedding/honeymoon activities. August was busy at work and I had just started re-reading Chronicles of Ancient Darkness. But I finished the original hexalogy and had to wait 3 weeks to receive the new trilogy. Then I got a second raise through the mysteries and blessings of poor municipal administration. So I had to push on, which led me here. I plan to update my “[Month] Readings” with the arcs of OP I read as it is literature too, I am told.

Chronicles of Ancient Darkness: Viper's Daughter – Michelle Paver

This is part of the newer books in the series and the first new material I'm reading in a bit. Unfortunately, there is currently no french translation of the new trilogy and I had to read it in english. Readers will know that I can in fact read english, however, reading a series in one language and switching more than halfway through to another is weird, even for me. Localisation didn't change too much, but some terms of magic — or names of this and that fictitious river and such — I had trouble with. Also just from an english reading comprehension point, I had some issues with some names of specific plants and animals and very specific movement verbs (eg. to hobble, clamber, lurch...). Overall I was able to understand everything, even if I had to re-read some sentences here and there. The end of book 6 made it seem like something happened, but it doesn't and it is also never really addressed. It was literally an “I'll be back” moment. Story-wise, the rest makes sense, it doesn't need to retcon anything. The author is also using stuff introduced in the previous books, while adding some new material. It is done well and the universe stays coherent. Not sure if it's because of the tone of the english version, or because the author changed her style in the 11-year hiatus from the first six books, but the books seem to be more aimed at young adults as opposed to early-mid teens. It is a welcomed change — as you might know, I am a young adult — and I think it suits the universe better.

Also the covers for the english version are far better in my opinion

And that's it for this month, a couple more books than usual, but they were all pretty much from the same vein. I will try to diversify it in October, but I make no promise.

Thanks for reading my logorrhea, Eddie