Ascendance of a Bookworm: Fanbook 1 Review
Ascendance of a Bookworm: I’ll do anything to become a librarian! Fanbook 1
Honzuki no Gekokujou: Fanbook 1

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No spoilers for Ascendance of a Bookworm: Fanbook 1. But I did want to do a quick review of this first fanbook of the series, of which there are apparently several. Apparently, it shouldn’t be read until reading Ascendance of a Bookworm Part 3 Volume 2, which I haven’t done since I don’t think Part 2 is done yet. 😅

The Book

That aside, this 76-page fanbook is roughly the size of a standard, American comic book, only with a better cover. Unlike the manga, J-Novel Club thought it wise to make the fanbooks in Western publishing orientation. I rather doubt the Japanese versions are this way, so why do it, especially since there’s a manga chapter in here? 🙄

Regardless, the first 25 pages are color art, mostly cover art from the novels. The next six pages are sketches. So there are spoilers of a sort in the art. That and the first page of the short story Temple Tour are done in glossy, heavy duty paper. The rest of the book is done in traditional but good quality print paper. While I like Suzuka-sensei’s art style better, Shiina-sensei’s art is nice.

After the short story, ten pages are dedicated to character sketches. Again, some spoilers here if one hasn’t read through the required section. Suzuka-sensei draws the six-page manga, which is unflipped and requires a right-to-left reading even if they made the pages left-to-right ’cause “reasons”. I didn’t read these due to the spoiler issue. So no review there. But it seemed interesting.

The next fourteen pages are an impressive interview with Kazuki-sensei. Shiina-sensei (the novel artist) then gets a couple of pages to do some manga comic strips. And the two artists and author give a final note.

Final Thoughts and Conclusion

While I can’t speak to any of the story elements, I love having books with unspoiled artwork. Interviews with a series creator are always a good thing as far as I’m concerned. So all in all, if you are a fan of this franchise, then I’d highly recommend Ascendance of a Bookworm: Fanbook 1.