A light novel (ライトノベル raito noberu) is a style of Japanese novel primarily targeting middle and high school students. Such short, light novels are often called ranobe (ラノベ) or LN in the West. They are typically not more than 40,000–50,000 words long (the shorter ones being equivalent to a novella in US publishing terms), rarely exceed 200 pages, often have dense publishing schedules, are usually published in bunkobon* size, and are often illustrated(with popular anime style covers and illustrations in the beginning of each story). The text is often serialized in anthology magazines before collection in book form.
Bunkobon: Small-format paperback books, designed to be affordable and portable. The great majority of bunkobon are A6 (105×148mm or 4.1"×5.8") in size and are sometimes illustrated. Like other Japanese paperbacks, they usually have a dust wrapper over a plain cover. They are used for similar purposes as Western mass market paperbacks: generally for cheaper editions of books which have already been published as hardbacks. However, they are typically printed on durable paper and durably bound.
List of Light Novels[]
Author: 山形石雄
| The Armed Librarians and The Bomber Who Fell In Love 『戦う司書と恋する爆弾』 | |
| The Armed Librarians and The Lightning Fool 『戦う司書と雷の愚者』 | |
| The Armed Librarians and The Labyrinth of The Black Ants 『戦う司書と黒蟻の迷宮』 | |
| The Armed Librarians and The Stone Sword 『戦う司書と神の石剣』 | |
| The Armed Librarians and The Sorceress' Recollection 『戦う司書と追想の魔女』 | |
| The Armed Librarians and The Straw Rope Princess 『戦う司書と荒縄の姫君』 | |
| The Armed Librarians and The Liar's Feast 『戦う司書と虚言者の宴』 | |
| The Armed Librarians and The Beasts of The Final Chapter 『戦う司書と終章の獣』 | |
| The Armed Librarians and The Despaired Devil 『戦う司書と絶望の魔王』 | |
| The Armed Librarians and The Power of The World 『戦う司書と世界の力』 |
(source:WikipediaJP)
Interview with SuperDash:[]
According to an 'Author & Illustrator interview' with 'Shueisha Superdash', the author shared his views about his series 'Bantorra'. The novel that left the most impression was the last novel, followed by the sixth. As for the scenes that he singled out personally, they were:
- "The Monodrama of Winkeny" in Book 3
- "The Morning of Hamyuts & Mattalast" in Book 4
- A scene that involved Niniu in Book 9
Yamagata-san's favourite character is Mattalast. And others that made it to his list were Enrique, Noloty and Winkeny. He went on to express the other characters like Lascall being the most convenient, Hamyuts and Ruruta being the ones who suffered most and the ones he had wanted to be more involved were Ireia and Minth. Volken ended up as the one he was most apologetic to. To Yamagata-san, there isn't a character who is bad and that all are good.
Yamagata-san also expressed that Bantorra would not have come this far without the talent of illustrator Maejima-san. Yamagata was impressed with his skills and went on to praise him in relation to the characters.
As the interview reached its closure, Yamagata-san made a point to the audience that through the various engagement of mortal combats of the Armed Librarians, the basis was a love story.
In response to the manga version by Shinohara-san, since the story of the first novel has a dark setting and atmosphere, he didn't expect to see a cute and pretty derivation. As for the anime version, the author entrusted the task to the anime staff. When he was invited to an event before the broadcast, he was pleased after watching the first two episodes and thought that it was really a great work.
Source:Shueisha