Binary Soul

I am quite happy that i am the first to post a review hehe first dibs!!

So the first few chaps were a bit confusing as the author was stil trying to find his own way  as how he/she wants to make the structure of his writting.

What i mean by this is that it was confusing as to whom was talking you kinda had to fiddle a bit and reread parts to know who is talking or what they meant with inside jokes ect.

After some time i either got used to it or the author got better at it as of the latest chaps i think its the latter so keep up the writting ^^

As for the story itself i like the interactions between Ellie and Kira its just Kiramazing hehe.

Release speed is very decent a very mayor good point as many peeps on royalroad want to make stories with 100+ chaps but never even get farther than 15 chaps or so -.-..........

I hope to read the completion of this novel.

Oh one last thing the first 10-15 chaps or so i wasnt really amazed til the interacactions between Ellie and Kira became rahter uniq at that point i am now waiting each day for a new chap to be released as i cannot wait for more fluffy weird antics of these 2 chars.

This says a lot it doesnt feel copied but rather original to the 2 chars.

Here I am, posting a review. Since there currently is a lack of actual reviews on this story, either they are too short or just plain wrong.

So let's get the most important question out of the way: what can you as the reader expect?

This is a lighthearted comedy novel lending heavily from Japanese, not meaning that the novel is littered with Japanese words (thank god), but in the style and comedy itself. If you are well versed in your Japanese literature, you'll recognise the style. As it comes with this type of writing, the story has an utter lack of seriousness (as it should), though it briefly touches in a dark subject here and there before quickly moving on to something more light.

The few dark glimpses of reality here and there the author uses to express a rather violent comedy, mixing it with the lightheartedness and thus becoming lighthearted but funny violence? Dear god, is that a thing?

Anyway, the question is now: How well did the author do in adopting the foreign style and comedy?

Comedy:

Now, I can for the love of God not actually remember what it's called, but it starts with a "t" I do believe. The concept of it is simple, you first have one short sentence, then follow it up with a just as short sentence. It has evolved a bit it though, so itcan work in different ways. Here's two simple examples:

1) Sentence A makes a statement and sentence B complete refutes it.

2) Sentence A makes a statement and sentence B reinforces it.

Sentence B is recycled for comedic effect as new sentences keep popping up, acting as A. For instance in this story there is a brief period where sentence B consists of "Since I'm the wife" (I'll try and remember to fetch a direct quote).

In this story this sentence B is one used by Ellie, however the very final time it is used by Kira instead. The sentence following that is a "Huh?" to underline the event. To me this shows that the author is well aware of what he is doing and I believe he is doing an excellent job at playing around with it.

Now the result of using this style is that the sentences are short, but I don't understand how xion03 has problems evaluating it. I was even just pulling out one example from these 60 chapters, so there is more than enough to go on if you want to try and evaluate it.

The inspiration from Japanese comedy is also apparent in how the situations they are getting into are having a race for ridiculousness, all from Kelly's mug to bone snapping.

Now if you happen to have a soft spot for Japanese comedy, then I think you would like this one. If you think the Japanese are an unfunny bunch of pricks, then you should probably dodge this one.

Style and story:

Now there is of course still a few things to cover in regards to style, I am however welding this together with the story section.

Let's first cover the POV. The POV changes are quite clear in that it's one character per chapter, and it's stated at the very top. As such there are no problems in regards to following who we are with. The comedic style that the author went with prohibits the POV's from being too personal, though the personal touch is in what we see.

For instance, I want to point towards the chapter where Ellie and Kira get their new toys. This chapter is through the eyes of Ellie, and as the first she gets her grappling hooks. In this moment the focus is shifted completely away from Kira and that, and instead she starts playi-training I mean, ahem.

Anything further than that isn't really possible, but I honestly don't believe that to be a problem. I'll go into details on why in the 'character' section.

As a final note on style, perhaps the only really negative thing I can say about this story is that the author took maybe a bit too much Japanese inspiration. In Japanese it's never necessary to state with a name who is talking as it is visible through other means. As such the early chapters in this story suffers from the issue that you might get confused about who's talking. It is for the most part clear though, so I won't really rack on the author a whole lot about this.

For now, let's cover story. When it comes to stories like this one, there is usually very little plot going on, and there is never a final definitive goal either. In this one there is a small goal for every arc, such as them getting married or recovering boxes or so forth. It's always clearly stated, as such the reader is never left wondering what is actually going on. The author also doesn't state things such as "okay, in this arc we are going to pet a dragon" and then five minutes later they are fighting moonmen. It's clear cut and straight forward.

As such the story itself, simple as it is, is easy and nice to follow, and you always know what's going on. Sure you have no idea where it all leads, but why must everything lead to something? Sometimes it's the journey.

Characters:

Like the story, the characters are straight forward and simple. They have clearly defined traits, such as Ellie being jealous, Kira not wanting to kill anyone, Kelly being an alcoholic and so forth. This is again a deliberate touch from the author; how can the story be lighthearted and simple if he's trying to stack all kinds of complicated character traits onto the characters?

Not only that, if he was to sit down and write heavy chapters going deeply into character development he would have to completely abandon his previous style. As such the characters are simple, but cute. They are everything they need to be, nothing more and nothing less.

Final words:

Now this (probably way too long) review is finally leading to this.

What makes a good story? Is it a complicated plot? Deep characters?

I say no.

What makes a good story is that the author knows what he is writing, what he is trying to achieve and then stays on track.

As such I'm not going to yell at the author about how the characters are simple, how the sentences are short or something else.

As far as I can see he executed the style he went with pretty much flawlessly, and so I have to conclude that the author did achieve everything he wanted to.

Cute and honest, as Sedactive put it, is a good way to describe this story.

If you like Japanese comedy and are up for a cute, lighthearted journey then I can't recommend this story enough.

Good job author, keep it up.

Don't be put off by the mass posting of early chapters, this fic is well worth a read. The style and structure slowly get better, so don't be put off by all the one-sentence paragraphs. The story and grammar and characters are excellent from the beginning. 

AND IT'S SO CYGNAS-DAMN FUNNY!! I LOVE THIS!!

mmh~ I read a few more chapters and realized that my previous review wasn't fair at all.

my opinion didn't really change: i still am a little put off by these endless tsukkomis, but i no longer think i should reduce my rating because of that. It was a style choice of the author, and this style was executed well.  As such, I'm clearly not qualified to write a proper advanced review and rewrote it into this.

cutting to the chase: interested people should just read the first chapter. its pretty short and  the rest of the novel is exactly like that.

/edit: The style does change over the chapters. I'd say its a little shallow for the first 20-30 chapters, but it progressively gets better. now, at chapter 80, i'd consider it really well done

When I first started reading it, the story felt a little off.  Like to much was going on a once.  To many details being thrown out.  After a few chapters though, everything started to click.  Now reading it is a constant flow of LOL, with just enough drama and plot to keep it together.  Its great.

This story isn't deep.  If your are looking for detailed worldbuilding where you learn the nitty gritty of of how everything works you won't find it here.  If you don't like senseless violence you should probably move on.  If however you are looking for a comedic tale that doesn't take itself particularly seriously, and that is written in a style reminiscent of Japanese web novels without actually pretending to be one, then this is the story for you.  

Less a review than a comment. I know it's for affect and an experiment, but please don't ever use this writing style again. The short choppy one sentence paragraph after one sentence paragraph starts to become a drain to read considering the line breaks you use between each. Nothing flows and the entire thing becomes a staccato of disjointed ideas that should connect but don't.

It works for dialog; statement, paragraph break, counter statement, paragraph break, counter counter statement.. and onto infinity. But for internal monologue instead of giving each thought the feeling the character thought something, paragrap break, they thought something else, paragraph break, another thought... as each thought comes to them; it instead slows the process of telling the reader the story down and makes it seem like the characters are incapable of having complex thoughts. i.e., they are stupid.

So...I'm quite liking this one so far.  I've read all of the currently released chapters (through 74), and I can't wait for more!  The grammar is solid - not perfect, but definitely nothing that would detract from the reading experience, and with minimal errors.  This story reminds me a lot of Terry Pratchett's Discworld series, in the ridiculous situations and character personalities.  As Pratchett is one of my favorite authors, I'm a big fan of anything that follows in a similar vein.  I can't wait for more chapters!

I like stories where sci-fi meets fantasy.  In this story, a girl from the stars cra... er, lands on a planet with magic, swords and monsters.

The characters are memorable and unique.  The overall story is a good one, with a good use of various points of view to help progress the narrative.  The icing on the cake is that there are times when I just can't stop myself from laughing!

I highly recommend this story for anyone who is interested in fantasy novels or a sci-fi fantasy mix... or just wants a good laugh.

Very enjoyable, very quirky, and easy to read.