Here are my top 2 picks for newly released light novels that came out during the month of December.

For my first ever post, I decided to start with what I hope to be a mainstream service as part of my blogs, the top picks. These posts will occur once a month and will give an overview to a couple of my favourite newly licensed series that came out within that month. These will be series that I view to be head and shoulders above the rest of the new licenses that came out that month.

Anyway, enough explanation, lets get down to the bits that readers have actually come to read, the recommendations!

1) Magical Explorer Vol. 1: Reborn as a Side Character in a Fantasy Dating Sim. (Published by Yen Press)

Tags: Comedy, Action, Adventure, Fantasy, Romance, Harem, Isekai

Written by Iris and illustrated by Noboru Kannatuki, this series was one of my most anticipated of the year when it was originally announced by Yen Press in the summer. After finally getting a chance to read and absorb everything this series had to offer and can surely say that it lived up to my original hype!

Balance is the key to this series’ success. It superbly manages to balance the more absurd comedic eroge side of the series, poking good fun at both the dating sim genre and otaku culture in general, whilst still managing to create some more power fantasy and more serious moments. As a fantasy novel, it’s not afraid to tackle much sadder and darker aspects to the world including the main character, Kousuke’s own tragic past.

As a prologue to the series as a whole, the series masterfully runs the line with the amount of characters its willing to introduce in order to properly develop each of the characters, allowing for you to become absorbed within the world and really end up routing for the main cast. Kousuke is the most well rounded character of the series so far, starting off by becoming obsessed with the world of magic and how to properly develop and train his skills. Whilst he views these abilities as a necessity in order to survive the main story of the original game, he also seems to genuinely enjoy the challenge that learning the new skill brings and the knowledge that he receives as a result. By the end of the novel, Kousuke’s character goes through an evolution, finally deciding a path for himself within the world and comes out more determined than ever to ensure that himself and those he cares about end up on the best timeline and receive an all important happy ending, whatever that may be.

Two other characters that have a large focus put upon them in the first volume are, Ludie, the royal Elf Princess, and Yukine, a noble’s daughter. Whilst Ludie is probably the secondary main character and has a lot of the storyline dedicated to events surrounding her, I believe that it is Yukine who has the best character moments in the volume. She clearly has the best rapport with the protagonist of all the characters so far, their equally determined nature and passion for training leads to some really nice moments and creates a good solid foundation of friendship between the two and obvious inklings of something more that could later develop between them. It is likely that, Ludie, is meant to be developed at a much slower pace given the fact that the author clearly has a lot more plans for the character throughout the upcoming volumes as suggested at the numerous plot threads the first volume leaves open.

Finally, let’s talk about the last main aspect of the series, the comedy. Usually this more absurd, fan-servicey type of comedy doesn’t work for these types of fantasy novel, at least for me anyway. However, this is one of the rare examples where it works, it manages to toe the line in a similar fashion to a series like Highschool DxD. These types of scenes serve a purpose and most importantly of all, the sex gas alien from Torchwood finally gets to be a part of a good story.

Overall, a fantastic first volume that’ll certainly satisfy anybody looking for a good fantasy series to read, as long as you don’t mind a bit of fan-service.

2) From Toxic Classmate to Girlfriend Goals Vol. 1 (Published by Tentai Books)

Tags: Comedy, Romance, Slice of Life

My second choice for this month comes from a genre that we don’t often see get licensed over here in the West (especially when you consider the amount of fantasy series we have), the fluffy romcom.

This genre prides itself in its overall lack of misunderstandings drama and instead focusing on the developing romance between the two protagonists with a bit of comedy thrown in. Toxic classmate manages to follow this formula whilst still feeling fresh within its genre. In order to maintain this style of romantic comedy, the author, Fukada Sametaro, pairs the archetypal tsundere character alongside someone, who I can only describe as a Sherlock Holmes-type character and instead of murder mysteries, he is able to solve the mysteries behind Koyuki’s emotions.

The interactions these two characters have because of these traits are hilarious, as Koyuki attempts to hide her embarrassment as her crush is mercilessly revealed through Naoya’s deductions. His abilities also come in handy when it comes to other members of Koyuki’s family – helping to solve some of their problems unaware that he’s slowly building up trust and eventually permission to date their daughter. It’s almost as if he has a cheat skill like someone from a fantasy/isekai series.

Now, just because there’s a lot of comedy in this series doesn’t mean that there aren’t any meaningful character and relationship developments. The reason why both of these characters work so well together is because they can bounce off each other and help each other to develop emotionally. Both have significant amounts of past trauma and understand what each other need in order to overcome these issues, whether it be a reintroduction to their classmates and finding new friendships or opening up and finally realising that not everything is so black and white and that people’s emotions are fickle.

Overall, this is a really good example of a light novel romcom and I’m looking forward to seeing how their relationship develops in the next volume.

Magical Explorer Vol. 1 is available to purchase from: Amazon, Bookwalker, WHSmiths and Apple Books.

Toxic Classmate Vol. 1 is available to purchase from: Amazon, Bookwalker, Tentai Books