Light Novels

[Kevadu]

I'm curious is anyone else here reads light novels.  If you have no idea what I'm talking about it's a popular style of short novel in Japan that tend to have a distinct, simplistic, and dialogue-heavy writing style and are basically always serialized.  They're accessible to younger readers but not always strictly aimed at them.  The closest English equivalent I can think of would be something like Harry Potter if Harry Potter was a whole genre.  Of course they're not all of the same quality.

If you watch a lot of anime you've almost certainly seen something that was adapted from a light novel series (whether you know it or not).  It has become very popular to do so these days.  Some of the more famous examples include Suzumiya Haruhi, Full Metal Panic, and To Aru Majutsu no Index.

While popular in Japan, commercial translations of light novels to English are still pretty rare.  But there are a few that I am following, such as the aforementioned Haruhi (which is available in a really nice hardcover version too), Spice and Wolf, and Bungaku Shoujo ('Book Girl').  It doesn't hurt that these were some of my favorites even before they were picked up commercially.  Bungaku Shoujo in particular I highly recommend, the first English volume of which came out pretty recently.

Of course, there are also non-commercial fan translations of a lot of these novels.  They're not exactly legal and the quality can be variable but they're out there.  One series I particularly recommend is Utsuro no Hako to Zero no Maria.

I know there are a lot of anime/manga fans around here so there must be somebody else who reads these things.

[Ashtrot]

In general I find light novels to be shoddily written, due to a lot of them fitting into the moe stuff. However, there are a few gems. My favorite by far the Full Metal Panic series, which is written well, can involve rather mature subject matter, and has a fascinating story, but also never takes itself TOO seriously (one story has Sousuke and Kurz going treasure hunting; they find the treasure but cause so much property damage they end up spending all the money they earned finding the treasure).

I'm also into the Suzumiya books, but they happen to be hit or miss; after 8 books the premise is starting to wear a little thin.

[Kevadu]

There are definitely a lot of stinkers and cheap cash-ins in the light novel world, but then there's the old rule that 90% of everything is crap...

I never actually read the Full Metal Panic books myself, even though I've seen all of the anime.  I should probably check them out sometime.

I wish somebody would pick up Bakemonogatari.  What little has been fan-translated looks pretty promising, and I loved the anime mostly because of the superbly-written dialogue.

Edit:  Actually, anime is exactly renowned for its dialogue but now that I think about it just about every anime series I have liked for its dialogue is based on a light novel.  In addition to Bakemonogatari there's Kurenai, Spice and Wolf, Crest/Banner of the Stars, Baccano, Kino's Journey...heck, even Full Metal Panic has some pretty good lines.  And they're all light novel based.

[insertnamehere]

I'd thought of getting into at least one series (has an anime movie or two) but I'm having a hard time remembering what it was called.
I'm pretty sure it was like a horror and possibly science fiction thing

[dalucifer0]

I have the first 10 FMP light novels (no job now, so I can't buy the last 2 right now...plus Amazon JP's shipping is $30 just to ship internationally, plus the books.) I've read 1 and in the middle of the second. My Japanese does suck at this point, but I can get the gist because I've seen FMP and FMP TSR twice. I've thought about the Haruhi ones, but waiting until the final one comes out.

[Eusis]

... Wait a second, these are books. What the fuck are they doing here?

*punt*