86--EIGHTY-SIX, Vol. 1 (light novel) (86--EIGHTY-SIX (light novel)) Kindle Edition

The author does a very good job of building the world around the character. It is so thoroughly explained and builds the image very well.

As I’m sure many others did, I was completed to read this series after watching the anime based on it. I would suggest to you to watch the anime first as the beautiful animation art, and mind blowing soundtrack add to the already emotional scenes. I’m not one to get to into the sadder, more depressive shows or books. I’m honestly not much of a reader at all. But the show was just so amazing, now holding a place at my #1 work of fiction of all time, that I just had to explore more of the world of 86. I listened along to the audiobook as I read this, sometime reading in my own, and sometimes just listening to the audiobook. I have never been driven to cry from a book/audiobook before. But the impact the show left on me clearly worked its way into my heart and still lingers there even when reading a story that I already know very well. There are differences but the anime adaptation is very true. That being said, I really prefer to novel itself. I’m excited to continue this story and plan to see it through to the end. It will be the first time in my life I’ve ever finished a book let alone an entire series of them. That’s just how amazing this story is.

I purchased the first 5 in this series as a gift so I can't comment on the content of the books themselves, but they arrived quickly and in perfect condition.

While I haven't read book 2 I have seen the series and I don't feel one is better than the other which often happens. The anime goes in depth after the final battle of what the journey through legion territory and more in depth of the distant romance between shin and lena. The book has many more details but fails to convey the emotions of each individual.But to anime fans like me I think it's worth the read

And that’s not a bad thing or at least I don’t know if it is yet. It was refreshing to read a story that felt entirely standalone. There was a beginning, middle, and end. The End is a perfect ending. If there was never another entry in the series, I’d be satisfied because that’s how good it was. Race, war, mechs, politics and v some light romance. In a medium where everything is isekai or bordering that in order to officially get translated, this was an amazing change of pace.The mech designs are fantastic too.My only complaint with the story is it really could have used a glossary. The author tosses so many races and terms and nations at you that it is difficult to keep track of. And early on, because of this terminology, I somehow missed that they’re fighting against an “Evil Empire” that is already dead and I don’t recall finding how they know that or where it was mentioned. Just suddenly I picked up on they’re fighting AI that was still following their final orders.I’ll fully admit that by the end, I still don’t get the racial politics or the Five Hued Flag or the importance of any of that. I just know that Alba have silver hair, they invited other cultures in, eventually reduced said cultures to less than people. It’s a weird disconnect the author failed to properly get across.

The frist book that has compelled me to write a review. Just to try and get on more person to read this if possible! At frist you might not like how Shin is basically the OP protagonist, but I would compare him to someone like Alucard from Hellsing( the OVA Ultimate). When I read through the fights I don't feel like there isn't a risk to our heros but at the same time I'm not only forcing my self to read through a horrible script of our protagonist winning a fight because he is different. I genuinely liked how everything flows, it's more like because he's deferent that I found my self drawn to continue to read about how did we get here to this point. The hook to this story is Shin the MC can hear the voices of the dead, and it wasn't always the case we have a gray area that something happens to him that causes this, it isn't explained here or even in volume 4(the latest released volume at the time of this review) but its caused him to drift farther away from his humanity to keep him self sane. In this book he has one goal with letting nothing get in the way to accomplish that. But even with his hax piloting skills it won't be enough to stop an immortal legion of killer robots that want your brians, the human brain is so complex that robots want it.

Overall I liked this story; I got interested after watching few episodes of anime. It conveys a broad range of emotions and has an unusual twist on racism, child soldiers, and war with the machines. The setting is completely unrealistic, though many things do not make sense from the narrative internal structure. i.e., if the oppressed population has mechanized weapons and it is repeatedly stated that Albas are not good fighters, why 86 do not storm the capital by force? The novel put parallels with WWII Germany's oppression of the Jewish population, but if we would reverse the narrative of the novel to the historical events. It would be that Germany would give the Jewish population tanks and send them to conquer foreign countries while supervising these forces by the radio. I doubt that this approach would be particularly viable. Some simple plot detail on some restrains (such as Battle Royale explosive collars) that makes 86 fights would add quite a bit of realism to the situation but would not solve all the issues. The whole purpose of handlers is unclear. The concept of the legion is an interesting twist on the terminator plot but could be fleshed out much more and made much more interesting. The narrative device of resonating communication where people can experience each other sences is interesting, but not really important or required for this story simple video calls would work as well authors gives a lot of attention to resonance but it has minimal influence on the plot. Ending in the form of an epilogue is extremely rushed. I feel the author has potential but needs to learn more about science, technology, and history to produce something more compelling than teenager oriented light novel.