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Jan 30, 2024
Mother's Contract Marriage is absolutely adorable. As someone who reads a lot of Otome Villainess esque manga I find this to be a breath of fresh air. I am so used to transmigrator child protagonists that act as if they are 40 year old politicians. Scheming due to events that won't happen for hundreds of chapters (or lets be honest, won't happen at all). I thought this would be the same sort of thing, oh how wrong I was.
Despite being the protagonist Lyrica is not a transimgrator, her mother Lydia is. Lydia apparently came back in time from some horrible future where her daughter
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died and she was executed for supporting the wrong side of the rebellion. Again, it's a premise that I've seen hundreds of times, however the difference here is that this manhwa revolves around someone who has no clue that any of this is going on being the protagonist.
Lyrica is a hard working daughter who tries to take care of her terrible mother who constantly gets them into more debt. She dreams of her mother waking up and becoming a better person... and this happens. With Lydia coming back in time she is not a completely different person and watching Lyrica needing to adapt to this is fantastic. From Lyrica's perspective her mother woke up as a different person one day. The mistrust and yet hope in this new mother is enjoyable, Lyrica also acts like a real kid too. She may have grit and has been forced to be mature due to her circumstances, yet she still acts like a child.
Seeing her react to typical troupes such as contract marriages and tragic backstories is so much fun, from contract marriages to step brothers from the king's dead brother, it's a refreshing take on the genre. I always think about the whole "the king was [i]bullying[/i] your mother all night" exchange often. Lyrica acts like an actual kid and it's so much fun.
On the other side of this I think about her exchange with the explorer often. She wants to trust her mother but also knows her history with scams. She decides to take matters into her own hands and meet this guy to see who is tricking her mother. She ends up being so moved by him that she gives the silver coin that meant so much to her in the slums to be a charm to keep him safe. It's a incredibly impactful moment in a series that is otherwise slice of life comedy.
And of course I can't fully discuss this manhwa without mentioning the art. It's such a bright and unique art style that fits in with the story perfectly. It has so much character and is the kind of style that means you can easily tell any panel from this manga based on the art. Just had to mention it because it's a standout among it's peers.
Ultimately I love how genuine this series is. I don't expect it to become plot dense and honestly I'm fine with that. Seeing Lyrica interact with the king and her mother and her brother in the most innocent but genuine way possible is what I want out of this series. It's funny, it's cute and I couldn't recommend it enough.
Reviewer’s Rating: 9
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Oct 9, 2023
I really enjoy this series. It’s an adorable romance story between a sheep princess (Momo) and her wolf butler (Aki. The artstyle is super cute and goes with the story incredibly well. Watching Momo try to get Aki flustered and fall in love with her is so sweet and relaxing. It’s just a feel good story.
I could go into specifics but the manga is short enough that I think your should just read it without me spoiling any more than I need to. While I would’ve loved to get more of these two I feel like where it left off was great, making every
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chapter count. It’s a super solid manga that I would recommend to anyone looking for adorable yuri romance.
Reviewer’s Rating: 8
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Jan 11, 2023
Yeah… it’s that time again… a raise your own spouse manhwa. This one gives me so much pain to review as it was one of the first Otome/Villainess manhwa I read and I was loving it. Sadly all good things come to an end and the fluffy child raising manhwa I thought I was enjoying turned into a strange relationship between her and her knight who had a complete personality change. How disappointing.
Estelle Castielo was born to an abusive mother (I mean this woman fucking locks the child in a suitcase while she goes out to have sex with people) only with the faint memories
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of a past life to keep her company. This all changes when the mother needs money so she decides to sell Estelle to her father and thus begins the first part of the manhwa. This part deals with Estelle learning how to be a child and enjoy things. She meets her father and her brothers and becomes close friends with the knights and everyone in the manor.
Her father gets to figure out how to be a father to a child he didn’t even know existed while her far older brothers try to figure out how to treat her and have fun with this clearly malnourished 11 year old. It’s very sweet and I was loving it. I especially liked the relationship between Estelle and Emel her knight. He cared for her a lot and they had a sweet familial relationship… well that wasn’t enough I guess because TIME-SKIP!
You know something is going to be poorly written when a really jarring time-skip happens and it completely throws off the pace of the story. It’s been quite a few years and she’s an adult now. With this I could go into how the series changes from being about a lonely child being cared for by everyone around her into a generic otome story between two lovers never meant to be surrounded by war and betrayal but instead I’ll just go ahead and rip off the brand aid and say that Emel is the fucking ML. The guy who helped her get over her fears and swore to be a knight to always protect her ends up being the ML and marrying her. All of this isn’t mentioning how he goes through a personality change when he starts to realize his feelings. He becomes argumentative and just unpleasant. It’s not terrible but it is noticeable.
I enjoyed this series so I would occasionally check out the newest chapter to see if it got better or changed or something (or maybe he wasn’t the ML) but no. Whatever. Just disappointed to see something I used to enjoy become this.
Reviewer’s Rating: 4
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Jan 9, 2023
Eyebags, that’s right eyebags. This manga is the one for you if you enjoy villainess esque troupes and eyebags. The female lead is obsessed with Mr. Eyebags and this whole thing is about their developing romance.
This manga is a good time. We follow Sharina who is your everyday noble student who falls in love with Riol a lower noble who can only be described as gloomy. She goes and makes him cookies and sandwiches and wants to hang around him all the time.
However a fuckoff prince thinks that Riol is the one hanging onto Sharina who he thinks doesn’t actually hate him but
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is playing hard to get. The fuckoff prince spends the whole manga harassing Sharina and Riol trying to halt their romance and peruse Sharina at any cost, I.E abusing his power.
I feel the manga focuses on this fuckoff prince a bit too much as I really like the fluffy atmosphere between the two leads and the antagonist does what fuckoff princes are best at, ruins everything about that. Granted the prince is supposed to be annoying and he gets his just desserts in the end, I just wish the two leads got more time without the prince as I enjoyed their relaxed moments together.
Reviewer’s Rating: 7
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Jan 4, 2023
"Though I May Be a Villainess, I'll Show You I Can Obtain Happiness!" is an anthology series about exactly that. It follows various woman in noble society who are labeled as a villainess and who in one way or another find happiness. In that respect it's a very wholesome and happy anthology.
I absolutely love villainess stories and this anthology just scratches the itch for these little bite sized villainess stories. In general, they're all enjoyable stories that leave me grinning at the end of it. I can't really go into more detail unless I start reviewing every story individually which I'm not insane enough to
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do (yet). Overall, I can say I highly recommend this wholesome little anthology, you'll really enjoy the short stories and fun characters contained within.
Reviewer’s Rating: 9
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Jan 3, 2023
WARNING! DO NOT READ THIS ABSLOUTE SHIT STORM!
“They Say I Was Born a King's Daughter” is every awful Otome Isekai/Romance trope put together into an absolutely unreadable and generally awful story. It's a typical "girl gets reincarnated into a medieval kingdom as a relative of a noble" but this time she is the daughter of the king (who would've thought).
In this society women are treated like scum, they are abused, enslaved and in general just have no power in society. This is due to the fact that only men can use magic, this makes them suppress all women… until the FL comes along
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who has magic and is treated far better than her magic-less counterparts.
The problem isn’t the whole “society hates women” thing in this manhwa, there are many with similar premises, the problem is that the FL just doesn’t really give a fuck and does nothing of note to change it despite being in a position of power.
So let’s actually get into the FL and the plot now. This modern girl from Korea becomes this tyrannical king's daughter and just vibes with it. Her brothers abuse all women... but her so it's fine. The king completely dotes on her and treats her like one of his sons instead of being locked up all day like his daughters (of which he has many) but since those other daughters are kinda mean it's fine. There is a part where she goes to a women slave camp, the women there are forced to do field work (among other things) all day and are beaten for resting. She comes in and gives all of them a bit of food and tells the labor people that the woman should get a small break every day. And then all the slaves love her because they get a tiny break! Hurray! How wonderful! Let's never bring up slavery again since giving a specific field break time and food one time is enough to deal with it!
The FL has some love interests too, all of which enjoy abusing her in one way or another. The one that really stands out to me is this guy who looks like her boyfriend from Korea (for context in this arc she is going to a noble school). She tries to approach him to see if it her boyfriend or just some guy from this world. He has some kind of emotional response to her or something and then tries to fucking choke her to death! Later they meet on top of the roof of the school, and he once again tries to choke her and throw her off the building! One of the other abusive love interests flies up to the roof (forgot to mention that there is magic in this story) and gives the guy a talking to. THIS FUCKWAD IS STILL TREATED AS ONE OF THE MAIN LOVE INTERESTS! IT'S FUCKING TERRIBLE!
EVERYTIME, YOU THINK THEY ARE GOING TO PROGRESS THE STORY OR ACTUALLY SOLVE AN ISSUE WITH THE WORLD (the whole abusive women hating slave loving society thing) THEY JUST SIDELINE IT BECAUSE AT LEAST EVERYONE TREATS THE FL NICELY! PEOPLE ARE TREATING HER GOOD BECAUSE THE KING TREATS HER GOOD. IT DOESN'T MATTER WHAT SHE DOES SHE'S ALWAYS GOING TO BE THE "KINGS DAUGHTER" AND INSTEAD OF TRYING TO CHANGE THAT SHE JUST ACCEPTS IT AND ASKS "DADDY" FOR FAVORS ALL THE TIME. GARBAGE CAN'T EVEN BEGIN GO DESCRIBE THIS MANHWA.
Reviewer’s Rating: 1
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Jan 3, 2023
I think this manga is a great place to start reading Otome Isekai, it introduces everything very effectively and has a ton of fun and unique characters. I especially like the blackhole of denseness that is Catarina Claes. The problem is that after a certain point you realize that this manga is just never going to fucking end.
I feel like there is a logical point where this should've ended, and it doesn't have anything new to say after this point, so it just keeps doing what it was doing over and over and over. The characters just end up in this constant love triangle
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with Catarina with none really progressing anywhere. I'm not saying there is anything wrong with a comedy focused slice of life Otome Isekai (I know of several that I absolutely love), but when your manga could be described as "derivative bliss" and you know that it's going to continue to derive on this point to the point of insanity is it really worth your time?
I love the characters in this manga and appreciate how it got me interested in Otome Isekai (and ended up being the first one to get an anime adaptation leading to a lot more to get them) and maybe one day I'll come back and continue reading. But I can firmly say that I can pretty much guess exactly what will have happened in my absence from the series... nothing of note. Still a fun read and I love her
"harem" just wish there was a little more development instead of the stagnation that seems to be happening.
Reviewer’s Rating: 6
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Jan 2, 2023
Well… that was disappointing. If you think that any of the plot threads that the manga sets up will be resolved in the slightest you should know that nothing is wrapped up, at all. The story just kinda ends.
Essentially this manga is the typical girl who read otome in her past life gets reincarnated into the thing she read in her past life as the villainess who gets killed at the end. The twist here is that she finds a way to make guns so she can fight her way out if need be. And by guns I mean all sorts of guns ranging from
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pistols to artillery. That’s a fun little twist, I’ve enjoyed other Otome Isekai with less variation, the problem is the way it presents it. There is a clear ultimatum, when the prince falls in love with the OG FL then the FL will need to fight her way out with her guns (or the more obvious thing being he is in love with her and finds her quirky but fun)… but that never happens… by that I mean the manga still ends with everyone being kids and her just thinking about the future. The entire manga is setup for something that never happens.
Sure the events with her surprising people with the power of her guns was fun (especially the big fight towards the end) and I like the protagonist herself; the fact of the matter is that she is constantly talking about something that never happens giving the whole manga a sense of purposelessness. Of course this is because this manga was cancelled! The light novel it is based on is apparently still ongoing and thus I assume it gets past her being a little kid (if it doesn’t my fucking god). Obviously it’s hard to hold a manga’s own cancellation against it but due to this cancelation this manga will always be left feeling incomplete.
Ultimately this manga is fun in parts but ultimately fails to deliver on any of the moments we as readers actually want to see.
Reviewer’s Rating: 5
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Nov 30, 2022
The Emperor’s Mask is a raw mess. It reads like a first draft of a story, full of tonal inconsistencies, unnatural dialogue and just a really uninteresting plot. I saw this as a completed otome isekai adjacent manhwa and wanted to read it because completed ones are a rarity… but alas, I had a hard time reading this because of how boring and dry it was. I normally eat up stories like this, even if they are shit, but god I struggled to finish this thing. And it’s only 70 chapters!
Before you proceed I should say that this review is structured but also reads like
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a rant. I started writing this thing and it just kept flowing out.
The manhwa starts with our protagonist waking up in the body of a woman in the “Rose Palace”, the place where the women who want to be the Emperor’s wife stay. She poisoned herself apparently (although this is supposedly common and the “chamberlain” is investigating the malicious potential of it) and now is this other person. The chamberlain is incredibly cold to her because apparently this is a common “attention seeking” thing that happens but in time he will find her InTeReStInG because of course he fucking does. She is so InTeReStInG, drinking poison and waking up with a new personality and without table manners. Lovely person. The FL doesn’t seem too concerned about it either, she basically wakes up, questions a few things and then decides that she wants to get closer to the Emperor that no one sees for some fucking reason.
Why does a newly reincarnated person immediately take interest in the aloof emperor? Who fucking knows, she knows nothing about him other than he doesn’t leave the palace even when the people who want to marry him are “poisoning themselves”. UGH.
In the end it turns out that Lucia (the original person who the FL possesses the body of) Father knew about the poisoning and was cool with it because he’s an asshole (he’s a father in an Otome Isekai, of course he’s an asshole). Ultimately it’s the supreme white lotus character who poisoned her (I say supreme because everyone seems to be white lotus characters and the one I will refer to later on is a different one hahahaha). This supreme white lotus character relates to the emperor’s brother who I’ll go into more detail about later.
So let’s talk about this chamberlain, this guy spends the most time with our FL and it’s pretty clearly obvious that he’s the Emperor but that doesn’t stop the manga from fucking with you constantly about it. They treat it like a mystery but also state it constantly. There is a scene very early on where this newly hired knight asks this other guy if the chamberlain is the Emperor. The guy says he is, they discuss it for a bit AND THEN AT THE END OF THE CONVERSATION THE ONE GUY THEN SAYS HE WAS KIDDING ABOUT THE EMPEROR BEING THE CHAMBERLIN. WHAT THE FUCK! WHY ARE YOU JERKING ALL OF US AROUND!
The FL constantly fucks with it too. She’ll think the chamberlin is the Emperor constantly, but seems to forget about it whenever he is actually around. She thinks it often enough to bring it up to other people and they agree and say it’s a rumour but when the chamberlin confesses that he is the Emperor she is absolutely shaken by it. WHY! YOU ALREADY GUESSED IT! She has the audacity to say “By some chance you really are the emperor” and acts like her world has completely changed, fuck off. And another thing, if the “chamberlin is the Emperor” thing is common enough why is the white lotus character making fun of the chamberlain. This thing makes no fucking sense.
Plus there is this one girl who accidentally catches a glimpse of the Emperor’s face (and by that I mean she opened his door and he was just there) and instantly falls in love with him. Why doesn’t she recognize him as the chamberlain? That guy is really well known, why does she not connect it! His face is the fucking worst kept secret of all time. Why is it even a secret, why does he need to masquerade as the chamberlin!?!?!?!? This girl also has basically no plot relevance beyond being the sister of one of the Emperor’s trusted subordinates. She barely shows up. Why did they make such a big deal out of her seeing his face and coming to the place if nothing comes from it!
And the plot isn’t even consistent with it, early in the story the chamberlain is complaining about the budget of the rose palace being too high. But when the financial advisor asks him if he will lower it he says that he needs permission from the Emperor to do it. YOU ARE THE EMPEROR AND EVERYONE READING IT FUCKING KNOWS IT, IF YOU WANT TO LOWER THE BUDGET JUST FUCKING DO IT! STOP MAKING THINGS HARDER FOR YOURSELF BY DANCING AROUND WITH ALL THIS EMPEROR MIGHT NOT WANT IT BULLSHIT. And he never actually ends up lowering the budget but instead has the “Emperor” (him) decree that the rose palace members must work to pay for part of the rose palace, this being a plot device to make the FL tutor his younger brother. I’ll get back to this later because she is such a trash teacher and it makes no sense for her to teach the fucking prince.
Speaking of the emperor chamberlin god is he insufferable. He hates and mistrusts everyone, unless they have bad table manners I guess. He also does not give a fuck about the poisonings going on, even scolding the FL when she first wakes up saying that the poisonings do not get the emperors attention (clearly they do if he is there). He’s one of those overly possessive assholes who thinks he’s always in the right and has fucked up morals but it’s fine because he was abused as a kid. What a poor poor kitten. ASSHOLE! One of her servants dies at one point and he has the audacity to get jealous of her caring about her and says “All we’ve talked about is your servants. Are they more important than the Emperor?”. What a load of bullshit.
The way the chamberlin/emperor reveals himself to everyone else is terrible too. There is this whole rebellion that randomly comes into the story around chapter 40. It was said before this guy wanted to rebel but the emperor gave him resources anyways to look benevolent. Well the rebels come and the guy leading them comes out and says he won’t follow someone who hides his face, so the Emperor just walks out and everyone is in shock. The emperor then denies sending aid to his land and the rebel just… gives up. Ok? After all of this the guy just gives up after seeing the guy's face??? And why is he ok with revealing his face now!?!? What changed!?!? I guess now he has someone he loves. Speaking of that after the rebels pledge their loyalty to him he then says “Lucia (FL’s name) you will report to my bedroom tonight.” God what a dipshit, could he not do this in private. When she rightfully gets annoyed at him he says “I see I put you in a predicament but I had no choice”. The white lotus thing ends here too with the white lotus being shocked that the Emperor was the Chamberlin (because she fucking stabbed him earlier and I guess expected that if she stabbed the Emperor’s closest ally (which was him himself) there would be no repercussions) and being sent to eternally rot in the dungeon. Good riddance Ms. Plot Device.
The funniest part of this manhwa is that I apparently read it before. There was this joke that I have been trying to find in other manhwa for quite a while. It was a joke about her getting a painting, the painter asking her what kind of painting she wanted and her just saying “Monkey”. And when the painting actually came she had this “monkey aura” she was giving off from the painting. It was a bizarre joke and I wanted to find it again. Well turns out it’s in this manhwa meaning this manhwa was so unmemorable that I had no clue until chapter 40 some that I had read it before. And the monkey joke suffers from being in this manhwa! The FL does not make wise cracks or jokes through the whole thing. Why is she now asking for a monkey painting? It’s out of character, they can’t even get that right!
Well now that we have the formalities out of the way I suppose we should move on to the atrocious story (besides everything revolving around if the Emperor is the Chamberlin bullshit because that is a good 1/3 of the story). It took me a long time to read the final 20 chapters of this story. I wanted to finish it before I wrote this but god it was such a fucking struggle. Anyways this won’t take too long because there really isn’t a story. It’s shit! Obviously the main story revolves around the FL helping the ML get through trauma… kinda maybe… they don’t really talk about it. The main antagonist is the resurrected brother of the ML who he killed to get the throne. He really doesn't appear till way late in the story. I mean it’s set up, mainly by him giving ominous dialogue at the end of random chapters but beyond that he doesn’t appear till way late.
So the big thing the plot revolves around after the chamberlin is revealed is that since her soul is not the soul that belongs to the actual body she is dying. She is told this by the magic tiger in the necklace she was given from the white lotus character that was supposed to kill her (kinda) but instead gave her a magical tiger. This tiger tells her that the only way to cure her soul an`r4d not die is to marry the Emperor for some arbitrary reason. Guess we should be happy she already wanted to do that despite not meeting him at that point. How convenient. And even after she gets with him and it seems like it’s almost certain they are going to marry she still tells him that she is going to die. You solved your problem without needing to do anything! Why cause more strife!?
Anyways the evil brother thing pops up again randomly after doing things from the shadows. Apparently the body was for him to possess and she just got in it somehow??? There is a whole conflict about him promising that if she gives him her body that she can go back to her old world. I understand the kind of conflict they are trying to do but it doesn’t work here. It’s given no time to breathe.
This kind of plot line works in a far better stories such as Why Raeliana Ended Up at the Duke's Mansion where she needs to grapple with her old life and her new life or even stories like The Duchess’s 50 Tea Recipes where she feels guilty about taking over the life of Chloé. In these two examples this moment of uncertainty is a climactic moment that has been built towards. But here it’s randomly dropped without any development. We don’t know a ton about the FL’s old life and what she’s giving up beyond being in modern times and her missing her mom. She wakes up and accepts it immediately and wants to get with the Emperor from the beginning. The evil brother says that if she should go back because she is going to die but the Tiger has already said that her old body is dead and impossible to go back to and that if she marries the Emperor (who is in love with her and she has been trying to get to from the beginning) she won’t die. So what’s the conflict here? WHY DOES SHE WANT TO LEAVE!? She mentions having connections to other people and being afraid of the alien world she is in now. Where was this development for the rest of the fucking story!?!?!?!?!?!?!? WHY IS IT COMING UP NOW!?!?!?!?!?
Also the ML takes this news surprisingly well. He doesn’t seem to be surprised about the evil ML and is fine if she goes back to her old world but wants to have memories of them together to remember her by. Honestly this is suprising considering he was fucking annoyed and angry about her being sad about her servant being killed. The FL also takes the evil murder brother’s word at face value and is actually preparing to go back home!? WHY ARE YOU TRUSTING THIS RANDOM GUY! UGHGUGUGHGG.
Well the brother ends up coming to the castle. But by the time he is given some kind of agency in the plot there are only 11 chapters left. The poisoner (the supreme white lotus) was his lover. She yells out for him when her plan is revealed and he appears just to say that he doesn’t want to save her and then he kills her hahahahahahaha. In response to this the emperor just says “You’re insane as ever Harry” hahahaha. Oh my god. AND THEN THE EVIL BROTHER LEAVES AGAIN AND DOESN’T APPEAR AGAIN UNTIL THERE ARE FOUR CHAPTERS LEFT! How am I supposed to take him seriously when it’s obvious the plot doesn’t. I mean he literally says “This is just the beginning” when there are three fucking chapters left. He has no time to be an actual villain because by the time he isn’t just being ominously teased the manhwa is already over.
They end up killing the brother by stabbing him with a sword covered in the blood of a living member of the royal family. This just kills him for some reason. I don’t know, nothing is ever really explained. They try to explain it in a flashback after he is dead but all the flashback says is that he will die when stabbed by a sword covered in the blood of a living member of the royal family and not why. Ugh. The plot has so many holes and inconsistencies and ends on a complete anticlimax.
In the end they get married (obviously) and they add in a thing about her possibly eating her wedding ring that he put into a cake. She has a ring in the final panel though so I guess she didn’t swallow it, I don’t know. This series has no consistency or structure so I should expect shit like this from it by now.
Now for some other random things that I wanted to structure somewhere but didn’t really fit.
What was the point of her becoming the prince's teacher? I guess it was to show that she was smart and to get the prince on her side so he’s cool with her marrying the Emperor but she teaches him fuck all. The lessons are either playing Baskin Robbins 31, making paper flowers or having him read a history book that, by her own admission, she just picked up randomly at the library. What is the point of her teaching him! She does nothing for him! And then by the time she finds out the chamberlin is revealed as the Emperor it just becomes sidelined. Not that it mattered much anyways considering half of the lessons end early because the chamberlain (and after the reveal the Emperor) keeps interrupting their lessons and sending the kid back.
At this point since I’m just complaining so I need to mention these orders she got. She got two massive orders for the same type of thing around the same time for her shop (she owns a shop that sells products made from rose petals). One of these orders is an excuse for her to meet the evil brother and get made the offer, the other one is a real order. She decides to fill the orders with candles instead of what they ordered and eat the pastries she made despite them ordering those pastries. Why? I have no answers.
Speaking of the shop, I need to mention this. It said that in the shop she has pies that sell well because people enjoy carrying them around since they smell good. IT IS A TREND TO CARRY AROUND PIES!
I also want to put this quote in this review but didn’t have a spot to put it in. “Eric, where I come from, there are two kinds of women. Cuddly bears and sly foxes.” If anyone knows what this means, specifically the bear part, please let me know.
I’m sorry about how rant filled this thing got at the end. I kept writing and my thoughts just kept pouring out. This manhwa just frustrates me to no end.
Overall this manhwa is a mess. It has no tonal consistency and leaves out crucial plot details until they just randomly pop up. The main plot is sidelined till the last ten chapters in favour of Chamberlain being the Emperor shit. Somehow it moves at a glacial pace but everything feels rushed. What an annoying read.
Reviewer’s Rating: 3
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Nov 9, 2022
This review will contain my thoughts up to chapter 78. Essentially, this is a good story that is currently meandering that could end up being better or worse depending on how some stuff develops. I'm also pretty critical of stuff in this review purely because I thought this manhwa was going to be one of the really good ones. I thought this was going to be cream of the crop Otome Isekai material, but it just isn't. Not bad, just more standard than I wanted it to be.
It's Hilise Inoden's 8th time around and she's ready to die. She went through whole arcs in
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her previous arcs from dying at the hands of her abusive family, to trusting an outsider who only married her for her blood to eventually killing everyone and then herself in her 7th life. Now it's her 8th and all she wants to do is die.
The story starts off really strongly with her basically speed running what it takes other series millennia to do. She recalls her previous lives and gains the power of the Inodens which is her family's power which is this pretty cool thorn-based spring power (the four major families have season-based powers). Only one person from each generation can get this power making it a point of contention in her previous lives as her father hates her for "killing" her mother during childbirth (what is with that troupe!?), her brother views her as nothing but a shield for her stepsister Gabrielle who is a spoiled brat who spends the whole story kissing up to whoever will listen.
I'll admit it, I'm a sucker for stories where the FL has agency, so this series had my attention right off the bat, especially since the whole "revenge" thing wasn't her goal in this life. As previously stated Hilise wants to die, really badly. She has been around 7 times and just wants it to end. So, she becomes the head of the family so she can access the super-secret library. Through that goal comes all the political intrigue stuff that naturally comes with this kind of story and like you'd expect from this kind of story all of that takes a back seat to the ML and FL's relationship.
Axion Berzet is an interesting ML. He's the head of one of the four major families and can use the power of autumn. The big thing that makes him interesting (because his personality is pretty standard) is that the FL had a bunch of different relationship with him in her previous lives with the last one ending rather horribly. Meanwhile Axion is having sudden flashes of her previous lives and what she meant to him in each life without really understanding what this means.
Obviously, the whole story revolves around her searching for a way to die while he slowly regains his memories and tries to convince her that living is better. I think that's a pretty good premise. The problem is the pacing, the pacing is all over the place. Sometimes it's really, really fast, other times there will be a ton of chapters dedicated to nothing. Another thing that messes with the pacing is the backstories. I have mixed opinions about this, on one hand giving each of her lives a full backstory that we get to see gives all of them emotional weight and gets us to fully understand the person she has become... on the other hand there is a lot of backstories, and the pacing does suffer due to it. Every life that she has needs a backstory that sets up character motivations, while this is cool is also kills some of the pacing. However, the biggest pacing kill is just all the nothingness that goes on in the story.
And oh boy the conspiracy stuff. It's whatever, for being the main antagonistic force it doesn't really have a whole lot of story weight, and what little story weight it does have just makes me thing of other Otome Isekai that have done big, weird conspiracies better but maybe it'll pull itself together in the end especially since they are trying to tie it to her previous lives by A: purposefully omitting information of what happened in her 7th life and B: making other characters remember the pervious lives other than Axion (which as of now I'm not too fond of, especially with her father remembering some stuff, but maybe the explanation will be pretty good).
Most recently the manhwa has been focusing on romance, finishing up her backstories (and by finishing up I mean they've been continuing them) and tying the first emperor with the main plot. In fact, I would say the most recent chapters have been rather interesting. I hope this is a continual trend and the whole conspiracy thing pans out as much as the author thinks it's going to.
All in all, I really thought that Solitary Lady was going to be one of those special Otome Isekai and I suppose I'm a bit bitter that overall. And you know what, who knows, maybe this will end up being fantastic with just a bit of a slump in the middle. The most recent few chapters have been rather good, and I feel like all the pieces are almost in play. I suppose we'll see.
Reviewer’s Rating: 7
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