I remember playing an anime game on my phone in high school, and this one classmate made fun of me for it. Not because of anime, he already knew I watch them and didn’t (seemingly, at least), care one way or the other. But because the game has a hub-like area where the characters are shown in a chibi design. He kept pestering me after that to try out Barbie games.

The “best” part? Dude literally said the game looked fun when he saw me playing the actual gameplay, and even asked me to let him play a round. Then the round ended, saw the hub, and he did a 180 on me and on the game.

To this day I don’t feel comfortable watching certain anime in public. I’m not even talking about ecchi here. Just basically any stuff that is “girly”.

Another is just ask for recommendations, I bet we can find you a couple of good ones if you are interested :-)

You mean asking here? Sure, I’d be down if that’s the case.

I’m not gonna talk about what books I enjoyed as a kid, cause I don’t remember all of them, nor why I enjoyed them. It’s been years. Besides, my tastes have changed, I’m sure. So I’ll only mention what I’ve read since late 2023, when I started to get back into it.

The ones I’ve completed are:

• “This Is How You Lose the Time War” by Max Gladstone andAmal El-Mohtar. Was good, maybe a bit confusing at times. I tend to like time travel stories in anime or TV shows, which is why I started this one. I gave it a 3 star rating, although I’m not sure how people interpret each star since I’m new, so it’s entirely possible that a 3 star for me is better or worse than something you’d also give 3 stars.

• “We Are Okay” by Nina LaCour. It’s currently sitting at a 4 star for me, but it’s more like a 3.75, but the site I’m using only has full and half stars, so I can’t go in between 3.5 and 4.

• “The Cat Who Saved Books” by Sosuke Natsukawa. This had a bit more on an anime-vibe to it, which is a good thing as far as I’m concerned, as a big anime fan. Or maybe it just felt like it did because the characters’ names were in Japanese and the story took place in Japan, since Sosuke Natsukawa is Japanese himself. 3.5 from me.

• “Warm Up” by V.E. Schwab. This is part of a series, it’s a short prologue of sorts (less than 20 pages, from what I recall) and I’m theoretically reading the first book of the main series, but I haven’t read that in a while. I’ll probably get back to it some time soon, but it didn’t grab me as well as the three books above did. As for Warm Up specifically, I haven’t rated it, what with it being so short. I didn’t know how to accurately judge something with so few pages.

• “The Last Murder at the End of the World” by Stuart Turton. My absolute favorite so far (although there’s not that many in total to begin with). I loved it so much! 5 stars. Ironically took me the longest to read out of these, but it was because I wasn’t always in a reading mood, not for any other reason. I already intend on reading “The 7½ Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle” sometime soon, cause it’s by the same author.

The one I dropped is:

• “Hurricane Heels” by Isabel Yap. There were some magical girl anime that I really liked, which is how I ended up picking this book, as I searched for magical-girl-like books. I didn’t end up liking it too much tbh, so I never finished it. Only read 12%, to be fair.

Currently reading:

I think I may have made a mistake by starting too many books, haha. I have these as “reading”:

• “Coraline” by Neil Gaiman. Gaiman has written some stories in Doctor Who, which is how I came to know about him. 24% so far, but haven’t read it in a while.

• “Vicious” by V.E Schwab. The first real book in the series I mentioned above when talking about “Warm Up”.

• “Fangirl” by Rainbow Rowell. This I’ve read more of recently. Yesterday, actually. 21%.

• “Pew” by Catherine Lacey. Also read more recently, as opposed to Coraline and Vicious. Two days ago was when I last read from this. 31%.

Anime, Cartoons and TV Shows:

As for my tastes in non-book fiction, I’ll mention some of my favorites here, in case you (or someone else finding this) knows about them. There’s not a lot of books I’ve read all the way through yet, so some non-book favorites could be helpful in recommending me books, I feel.

Some of my favorite anime in no particular order: Non Non Biyori, Steins;Gate, Vinland Saga, Bocchi the Rock.

Some of my favorite TV shows in no particular order: Doctor Who, 12 Monkeys (for the latter, I’m specifically referring to the TV show. I haven’t seen the movie that its premise is loosely based off of, because they’re not really related beside a common base concept). Just these 2 really, I mainly watch anime.

Some of my favorite cartoons: Gravity Falls, Avatar: The Last Airbender.

to be clear I didn’t mean that buying books in itself was throwing money away, more if you are unsure what you like from books and end up buying a lot of stuff you just don’t like it is a waste.

Yeah, don’t worry, I didn’t assume anything negative from that. I just wanted to clarify why exactly I don’t just keep on pirating them.

It’s not that I have money to throw away, but rather that I spend a lot of time in front of screens. Anime and games can’t be watched/played without a screen, but books can be read. Since I already look at screens so much, I would want to not do the same when reading if I don’t have to.

I don’t know much about Kindles, to be honest, so I’m operating under lack of knowledge here, but isn’t that technically a tablet of sorts? Or is it less damaging as a screen than a regular tablet?

I’m asking because part of the reason I’d want physical books is because I spend a lot of time in front of screens because I can’t watch anime or play games without a screen. But books can be read without one, so I would like to not do it on my tablet anymore, as I’m currently doing

I’ll look into the library in my city, though.

I’m not OP, but that one is on my radar, having recently read The Last Murder at the End of the World by the same author. With how much I enjoyed it, I have really high expectations of Evelyn Hardcastle, so it’s good to know it’s a great one too!

If by any chance you’ve read both, which did you like more?