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light novels

Isekai Skies (Monster Punk Horizon #2) Cover Reveal!

August 9, 2021 by hpholo Leave a Comment

Last week, you saw a peek at Book 1 in my new GameLit adventure comedy series, Monster Punk Horizon. 😀

Now, since the second is going to crash-land soon after its release – a month, to be exact – here’s the cover reveal for Book 2! 😮

Cover art by Jackson Tjota

Isekai Skies (Monster Punk Horizon #2)


🌟 GameLit 🌟 Portal Fantasy 🌟 Adventure 🌟 Comedy 🌟


✨ Coming November 18th, 2021 ✨

Audio Release Date TBA

🐉🐉🐉

I Got Engaged and Ended Up in Another World!

An epic convention. An epic cosplay. An epic engagement. It was the best night of Kaito’s life—until the ground opened up beneath him.

Well, technically, a portal did. Either way, it sucked.

Now, trapped in another world with rampaging monsters, he’ll have to learn to survive. Fortunately, this world is conveniently similar to his favorite video game. And he’s got monster hunting experts (?) Pix and Jaz to show him the ropes.

With their help, he might last long enough to find a way home.

But if not, at least he’ll have fun hunting monsters before he dies!

Preorder Here!
Or Read a Sample of Book One Here!

Last week, you met my series protagonists Pix and Jaz, two girls who just want to hunt monsters and pay off their college loans. They were born and raised in the monster-dominated world under the Dazzling Skies, so named because its sky is taken up by thousands of glittering portals to other worlds, which constantly dump interesting loot and monsters for them to hunt –

And sometimes people for them to save.

Which makes the Dazzling Skies a perfect setting for an isekai story.

If you’re unfamiliar with the word – “isekai” is a Japanese term meaning “different world” and refers specifically to light novels and anime in which a character is transported from their familiar world into a fantasy world, often with distinct video game trappings.

I was indifferent to the isekai genre when I first encountered it several years ago, but as the genre developed and began to play with and parody its own tropes, I grew to love it – especially Overlord, The Rising of the Shield Hero and – I kid you not – Reborn as a Vending Machine, Now I Wander the Dungeon (Review here, btw! 😀).

And, while I hadn’t set out to write isekai stories at the inception of this series, I quickly realized that the basic structure of the world I’d set up lent itself well to such stories. This structure, in turn, would allow me to show the bizarre world of the Dazzling Skies from an outsider’s perspective.

Book 2‘s protagonist, Kaito, is from a strange world himself – a far-future version of our world where everyone has hyper-advanced biotech altering their perception of reality, and where a particularly angry breed of cow changed the course of history – but the world under the Dazzling Skies is far stranger than anything he’s ever encountered. Though, fortunately for him, it does share some similarities with his favorite Immersive Video Game series … 😉

Isekai Skies (Monster Punk Horizon #2) is set to release on Kindle Unlimited this November, and is already available for preorder.

And again, if you’d like to be one of the lucky people to read it early, be sure to join the Pug Scouts – our VIP Street Team! 😀 I’ll be sending out eARCs soon, and all you have to do in exchange for your free book is post a review once the book is live!

Join Our Street Team Here!

In the meantime, keep your eyes on the blog next week for the cover reveal of Monster Punk Horizon #3!  😀

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Note: Holo Writing is a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program and, as such, may earn a small commission from any product purchased through an affiliate link on this blog.

Filed Under: Holo Books Tagged With: adventure, Anime, Another World, coming soon, Different World, fantasy adventure, GameLit, H.P. Holo, isekai, light novels, LitRPG, Monster Hunter, Monster Hunter Rise, Monster Hunter World, Monster Punk Horizon, New Series, Pokemon, Portal Fantasy, Tabletop Games

Reborn as a Vending Machine, Now I Wander the Dungeon, Vol. 1 – Light Novel Review

May 9, 2021 by hpholo 1 Comment

We’ve established before that I’ll pick up books for the sheer WTFery of their titles alone.

That said, there was no way I was going to skip Hirukawa’s Reborn as a Vending Machine, Now I Wander the Dungeon, Volume 1 (illustrated by Ituwa Kato). 😄

In Reborn as a Vending Machine, our nameless protagonist is a vending machine enthusiast (yes), who’s crushed to death when he tries to catch a falling vending machine (yes), and wakes up in a fantasy world with the brand new body of … a vending machine (but you guessed that already).

He can’t move on his own. He can only talk in canned vending machine phrases like “Insert coins” or “Get one free with a winner.” And though he can convert money into magical points to fuel himself, he’s in the middle of a forest and running out of power. Fortunately, along comes the adventurer Lammis. She’s a cute, sweet girl, and despite her size, her Blessing of Might allows her to pick him up like it’s nothing and take him to her home settlement – where she and her fellow villagers are fascinated by this new magical item. 😯

And, well, being a vending machine enthusiast in a vending machine’s body, he decides to do the natural thing – and become the best darn vending machine he can possibly be. 😊

I’ve had such hit and miss experiences with light novels that my only real hope for this book was “Please be readable, 😬” so it was a delight to discover that the novel was not only readable, but unexpectedly charming (and followed by Volumes 2 and 3). 😀

I mean, you have to admit there’s something endearing and admirable about a character who wakes up as an inanimate object and goes “Welp, this is my life now. Might as well be good at it.” And as absurd as the setup is, in the context of its own world, it actually works quite well.

Like most isekai (“another world”) stories, this one features a character stat and magic system where characters can take special abilities (here called Blessings) and amass points to level up. This is how Boxxo, as he’s christened by Lammis and the others, gains his Force Field (ever useful when thieves and monsters try to break into him). He also uses his converted points not only to power himself, but to upgrade his vending machine body to become more durable, and to add new items for villagers to buy from him. He has access to any item he bought from a vending machine before he died, and they’re all novelties to the characters in this fantasy setting – not to mention useful. Soon he finds himself being taken on campaigns to feed adventuring parties in the field, being asked to provide unique items to help out in the settlement, and so on.

The story is a simple, almost slice-of-life one (the major problem at the climax is that Boxxo gets stolen and…well, he can’t move on his own) but Boxxo himself carries it with his upbeat characterization and resourcefulness. It’s fun to see how he solves problems by choosing what to offer his customers, and his past life as a vending machine enthusiast is evident in how he chooses the products. (Several sections go into minor detail about the manufacturers of certain products and why said products were designed the way they were.) The direr situations in which he finds himself also require him to think quickly, to determine how to best spend his limited magic points for defensive upgrades, often mid-danger.

The other characters are fun, too, but frankly they’re just anime archetypes, and in fact a lot of the episodic situations of the story follow similar familiar tropes. (There’s a bathhouse scene, naturally. And speaking of such content, some of the illustrations are pretty obviously aimed at readers who like boobs, but the novel itself never gets more scandalous than Boxxo being embarrassed about being in the presence of said boobs.)

All in all, for an isekai fan who’s looking for something light, fun, and just a little different, Reborn as a Vending Machine, Now I Wander the Dungeon, Volume 1 is worth a read. To my own surprise, I’ll be buying the next two volumes, because familiar as it may be, there’s something just that delightful about the story of little vending machine that could. 😊

***

Note: Holo Writing is a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program and, as such, may earn a small commission from any product purchased through an affiliate link on this blog.

Filed Under: Reviews Tagged With: Comedy, Fantasy, fantasy adventure, fantasy comedy, Hirukuma, ituwa kato, light novel, light novels, Now I Wander the Dungeon, Reborn as a Vending Machine, Reborn as a Vending Machine Now I Wander the Dungeon, Recommended

Amusing Stuff H.P. Finds When Doing Ad Research

October 14, 2020 by hpholo Leave a Comment

When I’m not writing, my main responsibility is marketing our books, and a lot of that involves compiling Amazon Ad keywords – usually by researching books and authors that are similar to ours, and by seeing what kinds of books show up in our Also Boughts.

This often leads me down some interesting Kindle rabbit holes. For example, there was a period where, for some reason, a lot of the readers who bought mecha action-adventure Bane of the Dead were absolutely devouring … harem lit. 😳

That said, here’s a collection of some of the stranger books I’ve come across. 😀

I haven’t read any of these as of yet, but many are so weird that they’ll probably make their way onto my reading list at some point. 🤣 Enjoy!

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We’ve reached peak light novel, y’all.

Reborn as a Vending Machine, Now I Wander the Dungeon (Volume 1) by Hirukuma

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I don’t even care what this is about. I’m 100% reading for the dinosaur hands.

Rexus: Side Quest (Completionist Chronicles #3) by Dakota Krout

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I’m a huge fan of honest, straightforward, unashamed titles, and this is absolutely that.

Making Monster Girls: For Science! (Volume 1) by Eric Vall

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I can’t decide if science has gone too far…or not far enough.

Maid to Order: A Catgirl Harem Adventure (Build-a-Catgirl Book 1) by Simon Archer

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Bizarre light novel titles are my favorite thing in the world right now.

Suppose a Kid from the Last Dungeon Boonies Moved to A Starter Town (Volume 1) by Toshio Satou

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Ok, given how much I love animals and adorable things, I’d actually read the heck out of this.

Woof Woof Story: I Told You To Turn Me into a Pampered Pooch, not Fenrir (Volume 1) by Inumajin

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You know, given how much time I spend cooking and eating in games, I’d actually read the heck out of this, too.

Campfire Cooking in Another World with My Absurd Skill (Volume 1) by Ren Eguchi

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Have you read any of these little oddities? 😄 Tell me what you thought in the comments!

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Note: Holo Writing is a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program and, as such, may earn a small commission from any product purchased through an affiliate link on this blog.

Filed Under: Uncategorized Tagged With: book marketing, Build a Catgirl, Campfire Cooking in Another World with My Absurd Skill, Dakota Krout, Eric Vall, harem, harem lit, Hirukuma, Inumajin, light novels, Maid to Order, Making Monster Girls, Making Monster Girls for Science, Reborn as a Vending Machine, Ren Eguchi, Rexus, Side Quest, Simon Archer, Suppose a Kid from the Last Dungeon Boonies Moved to a Starter Town, The Completionist Chronicles, Toshio Satou, Woof Woof Story

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