skygiants

I was lent The Boredom of Haruhi Suzumiya months and months ago, but put off writing it up until I could read The Disappearance of Haruhi Suzumiya in the hopes that it would clarify my thoughts.

My thoughts: only sort of clarified! In that I quite liked Disappearance but that doesn't help me have much to say about Boredom. I mean, part of that is Boredom is all short stories I'd seen done fairly faithfully by the anime, so I have no actual new feelings about any of them.

The thing about Disappearance - which, hilariously, is billed by the publishers as a HEARTWARMING CHRISTMAS STORY a la "It's a Wonderful Life", mostly because it features Kyon in an alternate universe where Haruhi goes to a different school - is that the format Kyon gets to express sneaky warm and fuzzy feelings for everyone, while nobody actually interacts with anybody else and therefore nobody has a chance to be horrible to each other. This makes it by far the least frustrating of the books. Also we get to see explicitly the changes in Haruhi, Yuki and Kyon as far as socialization and investment in other people go, which is heartening and also provides reason to believe that they will continue to develop as people and be less horrible to each other in future. The less Haruhi is portrayed as a blatant sociopath, the more I am able to enjoy the series!

I had actually just finished reading the library copy of the light novel version of The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya when I found a $1 copy for sale at the Housing Works Book Fair. Which I bought, because for $1 it is a book I am more than happy to own!

It is hard not to make this a compare/contrast with the anime, just because the anime so closely follows the plot of the first book. I actually can't think of any major plot differences at all. And yet, despite the fact that they were near-identical, I actually think I liked the book a little bit more! These are my reasons:

1. I really like Kyon's narration, and you get more of it in prose! I think my favorite is the part where he is faced with a situation of extreme and immediate peril and is sitting there thinking, "pictures of this need to go on our website." Because if I were in the middle of an epic alien battle, my first thought would totally be, "I need to talk about this on LJ!" I feel sure I am not alone in this. In fact, I provide a poll:

[Poll #1413865]

2. The fanservice, while definitely still there and hugely problematic, feels a little less egregious to me because instead of being visual it's centered in Kyon's head. I still don't love the fanservice aspects, but I can cope better with the male gaze when the owner of the gaze is always explicitly a teenaged boy and I-the-viewer am not necessary expected to feel like part of the appreciative audience.

3. Also, Asahina annoys me a lot less in prose, because I can read her dialogue as more competent and I don't have to hear the baby voice.

I am looking forward to the next one when it comes out in translation in - October, I think? Depending on the wait after that, I may cave and start reading online, but we'll see.

IN OTHER NEWS: there is a fire inside me that won't stop burning . . . FOR THIS VID.