Guardian of the God
-
Return from the Hard Journey
(Book 6 of the Guardian of the Spirit Series)
Author: Uehashi Nahoko
Translator: Ainikki the Archivist
End of Volume/Hiatus Bonuses
Here are a few little extras to entertain you while I'm gearing up for posting Traveler of the Blue Road.
With the completion of this novel, I've now translated more of this series than both the official translator, Cathy Hirano, and other fan translators (that I know of) combined. I passed the 1000 page mark near the end of Guardian of the God.
That means that fan translation has tripled the amount of the series that's accessible to English speakers now. Yay!
But if you check my project schedule, I'm only 1/5 of the way done. So this will definitely take a while to finish. Thanks for your patience! It seems that more readers are starting to discover these translations, which makes me very happy.
Well, then, friends - Excelsior!
Image Gallery (with captions) for "Guardian of the Darkness" - PDF
Recipe for Losso (Balsa's favorite Kanbal comfort food, from "Balsa's Table") - PDF
Looking at those illustrations, it's clear the mangaka for Guardian of the Darkness was very much influenced by them. Come to think of it, I'd say the anime folks were, too.
ReplyDeleteLosso sounds tempted, actually. If I weren't such an abysmal cook... Maybe I can get a more-skilled friend to help. XD Have you made all of the recipes you're including in the extras?
I've made all the recipes, to test, since the Japanese recipes aren't always terribly specific. And I'm a decent cook. Losso is delicious. :)
ReplyDeleteGuardian of the Darkness certainly does have some beautiful illustrations. I remember picking up the English version of Darkness after reading the Japanese one and being disappointed at the lack of pictures. :(
I was disappointed neither book had illustrations. The gal they got to do the covers and the section-break pictures is a semi-famous artist, and I would have really enjoyed seeing more of her take on the books. But I also just love when my books have illustrations, in general. The Shannara books had illustrations - I thought that was just great. My books' spines are cracked where the pictures are because I kept flipping back to them.
DeleteI'd love a reprint with the illustrations and author's notes, but that would only happen if it sold a (lot, lot) more copies. And Guardian of the Darkness seems to be hard to get in physical form anymore, which makes me sad. It's overdue for a reprint, to my mind.
DeleteThe cover art for the American market was pretty cool. I like the more ancient fantasy inspired Japanese art, but I've got to admit the American covers are eye-catching, especially Guardian of the Darkness'.
Evidently Guardian of the Spirit was originally printed with blue ink, to emphasize the water connection. o_O I have the softcover edition, though, so I can't comment to that. I can say the paper they used for Darkness is very, very nice. It's a well-made book, that one.
DeleteThe Spanish editions (they did the first three) have really lovely covers, too. I especially like the cover for Dream. https://images-na.ssl-images-amazon.com/images/I/A1Tq7MvlVJL.jpg
Ah, I found a better link. Here's all the Spanish covers. https://cokenavarro.com/nahoko-uehashis-moribito-covers
DeleteVery nice! I like that art style. I wonder if the whole book is illustrated in Spanish. They did one book better than the English market so I like them better already :)
DeleteSadly, there are no interior illustrations (at least, not in Dream). A person on tumblr had bought the Spanish version before Tansoutsukai translated Dream into English, and she scanned it and sent me the scan. (Cuz, see, Spanish is easy compared to Japanese....) It didn't have any illustrations.
Delete*sigh* Shame. I loved, loved, *loved* illustrated books as a kid. And I still love them; why don't they illustrate books for adults? *grumble grumble*
DeleteWell, at least I'm putting the illustrations out there along with the translations, for all the people who are still children on the inside. XD
My dream is that someday, when my Giant Epic is finished and publicated, I'll be able to convince them to put illustrations. I had a super clever idea (to me) a billion years ago, to illustrate the whole thing with just pictures of hands. You could really show a lot that way. And it's weird and artistic. XD IF ONLY I COULD DRAW HANDS. Sadly, I can only draw silly cartoons, not actual serious art. And the person I hired for that dumped me and took my money soooooooooooooooooooo OH WELL I GUESS
DeleteI can't draw anything. *shrug* Maybe that's why I appreciate the pictures so much :)
DeleteI like having a guide for how to imagine the characters. I can't get a clear visual otherwise. :/
DeleteOh, I can imagine everything; I just like seeing how others imagine it. And Uehashi had a hand in the art, as well, so I really like how seeing how *she* imagines things. :)
DeleteI'm thinking I'd like to try cooking the losso either this week or next week. I told my parents about this recipe and they were surprisingly fine with the idea of their kid cooking something that came from a decade old fantasy novel, hahaha! If I understand it correctly, its basically an oily loaf of bread impregnated with mashed potatoes and some meat and/or cheese? Or would it be closer to a quiche? I wish there were some photographs to guide me along the way so I don't re-enact the disaster that occurred when I tried to make mochi for the first time. It ended up with a fish-like texture but actually tasted alright although none of my Asian friends wanted to eat it (in retrospect, I think I forgot the coconut milk, definitely left out the red bean paste, and probably should had used a cupcake tray).
ReplyDeleteFrom one of your comments on a more recent post it sounds like you are about to return to the office; if you need to delay the translation of a couple chapters here and there by a week or a few weeks then don't worry too much about it, I'm in a busy stage of my life, too and we are all grateful you were able to translate THOUSANDS of pages in under a year! That's hard work!
It's very forgiving as a recipe. Hash browns are the best visual of an existing food I can give you for them; Balsa orders them in early season 3 of the drama if you want to take a look at what they appear as "in-universe" (it's the beginning of episode 2 or 3, I think; "This is the taste of my childhood.") The traditional way would be to use meat and cheese as the filling. And using cream cheese in the potatoes makes the texture softer.
DeleteSo your mochi was just the wrapper? XD I've made it before (successfully!) but it took a few tries. I make anko brownies almost every week; my mom and I devour them. But aside from that I don't do much Japanese cooking. There aren't many pictures in Balsa's table, either, though I think there's one for finished losso...*shrug* I'll likely upload all the recipes and their pictures eventually. I hate uploading recipes without testing them, though. Losso had almost no cooking instructions, so I had to figure it out by trial and error. :)
I'd still like to finish translating the main series this year, so I'm shooting for that. I appreciate that there's no whip behind me and that I've largely been able to go at my own pace. :) Thanks so much for all your comments, and I really hope your losso turns out! Even my first failure with it was delicious :)