Short Synopsis: Natsume and his two classmates pay a visit to an old inn.
Episode Rating: 7,5/10 (Good)
Yeah, now I’m sure: this series SO needs a third season. What this series needs now more than anything is some sort of continuing story, and according to the manga readers, that indeed is about to appear, though there’s no way that the creators are going to fit that in only five more episodes. Let’s hope that the higher-ups of Brains Base feel the same way. ^^;

In any case, this episode was a great way to flesh out Natsume’s classmates a bit more, as they invite Natsume to an inn in order to spend some quality time on their homework (read: goof off). The second half of the episode deals with the story an old woman who in her childhood used the blood of a mermaid to save a friend she looked up to a lot.

Most of the episode was about both the woman and the mermaid coming to terms as to what they had done, so that both of them could receive proper closure. A standard story for this series, but it’s still a really charming story.

A few months ago, I was asked if I could do a post once in a while about some of my other interests aside from anime. It took me a while to think of something interesting to write, but I figured that I might as well use this post to keep track of the different books and novels I read from time to time. Do note that this list is over the scope of a couple of years: I’m a very slow reader, and usually take three months to finish one book. These all have nothing whatsoever to do with anime or Japan: most are either American thrillers, fantasy or European history, or a combination between these. Do note that some of these entries contain spoilers.

The Dreamers 1: The Island Thurn - David Eddings & Leigh Eddings
A story that takes place in a fantasy world, where a huge focus is spent on building up, and setting everything up correctly. While it’s a bit too caught up in its need to do everything by the book, give every single character background and enough time to develop, up to the point that there’s not much excitement along the way (nothing really happens through the first three quarters of the book), it does deliver nicely in the end, although nothing spectacular.

The Magic Circle - Catherine Neville
The prime example of how you can also get too convoluted. This novel set out with grand ambitions, as it attempted to tell a plot that spreads across 2000 years, with a story containing a huge amount of symbolism, referencing Jesus, Hitler some Roman Emperors and other notable historical figures all caught up in it. In the end, though, it becomes clear that it never really knew what it wanted to go for, and the story didn’t really accomplish anything, other than establishing the ridiculously complex family history of the female lead character. Seriously, in the end the twists about her family became so formulaic that you can almost predict the exact page at which the next increasingly ludicrous plot twist would arrive. It’s got a lot of nice trivia, though. The author really did some intensive historical research on this one.

The Collectors - David Baldacci
A very nice in-depth look in how con artists do their jobs, as we follow a group of four of them as they try to get away with a multi-million dollar scam. Great attention to detail, and a huge focus on careful preparation, only ruined by a joke of an ending which forsakes everything that the story has been building up for and instead goes for a nonsensical action end. The other story that runs parallel through the book also isn’t the most interesting: a bunch of old people solving a murder may sound good on paper, but it’s not the most exciting thing out there.

The Golden Compass - Philip Pullman
Excellent book, and I still need to get my hands on the continuation of this one. The whole idea of every person being accompanied by his own daemon (a sort-of animal that accompanies him everywhere; they even can change shapes for children) is fleshed out really well. The lead character may be just a little girl, but she’s a very likable lead. This is one story that gets increasingly better as it goes on.

Gone Baby Gone - Dennis Lehane
Absolutely fantastic. There’s no other way I can say it. The sheer imagination with which such a police thriller is told still amazes me. It’s an in-depth look at police cases involving missing children. It tells the story about two detectives, looking for a missing four year-old girl, and continues to keep the reader in the dark throughout the largest part of the book. But when a second child disappears, it finishes with an incredibly strong final quarter. I can safely say that this has been the best book I’ve ever read.

The Lost Labyrinth - Kate Mosse
This book tells about two stories as they intertwine: one about 12th century Carcasonne (France), and the other, happening about 8 centuries later. The former one is really good, with a likable female lead and a story that gets increasingly more interesting. The latter, however, just feels like second fodder in comparison. It’s full of plot holes, lacks detail and especially the romance that pops up near the end from out of nowhere feels a bit jarring. It’s got quite a few nice ideas, though.

Deverry: Daggerspell - Katherine Kerr
I’m only nearly halfway through this one at the moment, but I’m having a lot of trouble to get through it. Basically, this book is the first one of a large series of fantasy novels as it tells of a series of very annoying romances. Seriously, we have this guy who already was screwed in the head. His father dies and he continuously angsts and throws tantrums about it. He then proceeds to screw his sister and kill his best friend (no, really). When the bugger finally dies, you’d think that the annoyance finally stops, but no: he reincarnates, and the annoying romance starts all over again. Sure, in the end the story might have a very good conclusion, but I’m about to just drop it because people continue to behave like complete and unlikable imbeciles.

So yeah, one thing I noticed is that each medium has its own share of strengths and weaknesses. The things I noticed with these novels is that in nearly all cases, the thing that decides whether they succeed or not is their final quarter, the rest is all or mostly build-up. Nearly all of the above-mentioned ones either had very promising first halves, only to fall apart completely in the end, or fairly uneventful first halves, only to come together wonderfully in the end.

Another thing I can appreciate is the large diversity of lead characters. Okay, I may have just picked out the right books for this, but it feels like every lead character of the ones mentioned above comes from a different age group, as opposed to anime which tents to usually pick out teenagers. Still, the reason why I prefer anime to novels at this point is that novels lack the ability to suck me in and create an atmosphere. I’m a big fan of all sorts of things multimedia, and the thing I like about anime is how it combines all these things (audio, visuals, storytelling, etc) in order to create a coherent story. So yeah, in the end it’s just a matter of personal preference here, though with some of the above mentioned books, I’m glad to be able to have read them. Especially in the case of Gone Baby Gone. There are geniuses in every single kind of medium.

I may update this entry in the future as I read more. In the meantime, what are some of your favourite novels? I’m really a noob at this medium, so some help in deciding what to read next is always appreciated. ^^;