Critiques et Commentaires

Quite ambivalent about it after 3+ volumes.

On one hand, the story is clearly not coasting: in each volume Something Happens (somebody dies or is significantly changed, or we learn more about the lore).

On the other hand: there were several times where I wondered whether some pages were missing, the transitions from one scene to another could have been better. I often don't understand exactly what's happening in action sequences. Also the story doesn't escape some tired tropes: the hero has amazing skills thanks to his lineage, and a lot of female/third-gender characters are attracted to him for no apparent reason. They're also naked or almost naked at some point. The characters look a lot like each other. Even a grandmother looks like a teenager.

After having read several other mangas by Tsutomu Nihei, it's fun to find new iterations of previous elements though: the gaunas, Toha Heavy Industries, the ominous masks, a bear...

It was as enjoyable as the first two volumes of the Saint of Steel series, but at the same time I had mixed feelings about it.

On one hand, I really like the author's sense of humor, I enjoy following the relationships between characters in their late thirties (i.e. my age), and mixing romance with investigations on gruesome murders works really well apparently? I technically finished Paladin's Hope 10 days ago and haven't started a new fiction book since. I just... don't feel like immersing myself in another one for the moment.

On the other hand, I'm afraid that the series could get a little repetitive at some point. Until now, each of them followed a similar pattern. There are berserker paladins whose god died a few years ago, they feel broken, not worthy of love and/or dangerous for the people around them that are not fellow paladins. Until they meet someone and mutually fall in love, after having spent a very long time thinking about how unworthy they are of the other person's affection and vice versa (and there are also corpses that must be investigated). The paladins' love interests are well-rounded, interesting characters (especially the women of the first 2 volumes), but I wish I could say the same about the paladins. Their god died and it's, like, their whole deal. Stephen knits socks, Istvhan is large and Galen mustn't be touched when he's having a nightmare and... that's pretty much it? Their respective personalities aren't literally the same, but the whole "ugh how could they love me?" sort of evens them out I think.

The very end of Paladin's Hope hints at more development of one important plot point, and having a gnole as one of its main characters brought a breath of fresh air, so fingers crossed for more variety in upcoming volumes.

At first I was low-key disappointed: Mosscap's candid questions slightly annoyed me, and I was dreading the answer. The moment where the story would answer its central question: when all your basic needs are met, what else do you need?

In other stories about the meaning of life (or adjacent themes), I could always relate to the part with the questions, and end up disappointed by the answer that the characters find, because the answer specifically works for them, and not for me. It's probably impossible to answer this kind of question in a way that will satisfy every reader, so why even try in the first place?

And... well, I like the direction that the book took, especially in its last chapter. It made me think of How to do nothing, except that Jenny Odell explains you what Becky Chambers makes you experience.

Also, I just read it at home, with closed blinds due to the heat, while preparing for the heat wave that will occur during the next two days and reading about fires, drought and our general inability to address climate change fast enough. Even though the utopian aspects of the book's world didn't always work for me, it made me emotional to read a story when things actually improved and the world turned out fine.

What do you need? Well, today specifically, I needed a story like that.