Since you're working on your Blue Road fic, it just occurred to me that part of my prework might be useful to you. (Why am I doing prework on Traveler of the Blue Road? Because I'm already done with the prework on the next Guardian of the God novel and am busily translating it, and I try to always stay one novel ahead on the logistical stuff so that I don't get overwhelmed. :) )
Anyway, here are the chapter titles from Traveler of the Blue Road: Prologue: Waves from the South Part 1: The Mikado and the Crown Prince Chapter 1 - The Holy Sage’s Fate Chapter 2 - Letter from the Sangal Kingdom Chapter 3 - Bursting Open Part 2: Sailing into a Trap Chapter 1 - The Voyage Chapter 2 - Islands Form a Net Chapter 3 - The Prisoners at Night Chapter 4 - The Prisoners Escape Part 3: Chagum and the Hawk Chapter 1 - Encounter Chapter 2 - Purification Chapter 3 - Stars in a Strange Sky Chapter 4 - The Storm Chapter 5 - In the Hawk’s Talons Chapter 6 - Illumination Part 4: Confrontation Chapter 1 - Talsh Cavalry Chapter 2 - A Grim Journey Chapter 3 - Rain in the Imperial Capital Chapter 4 - The Palace of the Poisonous Spider Chapter 5 - Voices Crying Out Chapter 6 - The World Above the Walls Part 5: Traveler of the Blue Road Chapter 1 - Golden Clouds Chapter 2 - The Blue Road in the Moonlight
Nah, that would make too much sense. XD I think I just decided it somewhere along the way and failed to notice in the drama that the city was landlocked. This frequently happens to me while reading x y or z - I'll get an idea into my head very early on and then be shocked when I realise I got it completely wrong, even if the author never said even one thing to lead me to my original conclusion. The most egregious was when I read To Kill a Mockingbird as a child - I just decided that Atticus and Scout were Black, and when I realised 2/3 of the way through the book that they were white, I was flabbergasted. *facepalm*
Man, I need to read faster. XD I'm still mindblown by how fast you're translating these books. TBH I haven't touched my fanfic in a while, it's quite daunting and I'm trying to decide whether to try to bring it more in line with canon or not... I have to go back and read through it, and probably also re-watch the drama. Somehow that story's become far more intimidating since I decided to post it. >_<
I'm canonically picky when it comes to fanfic, so don't let my comments stop you or slow you down if that's not what *you* want. (Those comments were offered as information, not as criticism.) I've read incredible fics that tweak the worlds they're based on quite a bit and they've been damn good reads. The most important thing is what you want to say with your story, and what you want to explore. :)
I think Black Scout and Atticus would be an amazing twist on the story, but there's no way they'd let Atticus be a lawyer in that time period. :( Darn. I'd read *that* if it was a fanfic, though.
Actually, I know exactly why it became more intimidating: because now that I can actually read Uehashi's work, it's turned out to be even more nuanced, intelligent, and well-written than I expected, and that's a lot to live up to - that in fact can't be lived up to. It makes the idea of writing my own version of one of her stories seem silly. Kind of like when an artist does a cover version of a song that's already basically perfect. Even if the cover is fine, you're still like "but why though?" And if the cover is *really* inferior, then it's almost like an insult to the original version. That's what this feels like. Especially now that, in a few months, there will be an English translation of the book that I can read myself, removing the need for an English version of the story. *shrug* But, maybe after I've read it there will be reason to want a fix-it fic. LOL especially if Yun turns out to be a monster and/or gets left in Sangal to die or something. IDK.
Even if you think it's inferior, it's *yours*. It's your perspective and your ideas that were inspired out of love of canon. I think it's always the right choice to decide to care about something, even if it brings you some pain in the end. (I wouldn't be able to keep translating if I let my crippling insecurity slow me down...)
I definitely think there's room--a gracious amount, even--in "Traveler of the Blue Road" for expanded Hunter involvement. They spend a fair amount of time on ships and as prisoners that you could use for all kinds of shenanigans. (You could explore some standard tropes like seasickness, with the twist that they're only faking to get their own room, or have them cast running bets on how often one or the other of the crewmen gets piss-drunk and starts singing about nahji. The prison break could be a lot more elaborate and detailed. Maybe the Hunters have friends in Sangal, too?) You could also cut back to the other six Hunters at home playing poker and complaining that they weren't assigned to assassinate anyone fun.
I really like canon "Traveler of the Blue Road," but my enjoyment of it wouldn't diminish my enjoyment of a fic any less. I read fic because it builds on canon that I love; it doesn't need to mirror it exactly. :)
Sorry to put a bug in your ear about this, but I've been thinking about this comment for a couple of days. I read all of Cathy Hirano's public interviews on translating the Moribito series before I started all this, and she's said a few things about toning down certain aspects of the series for an English-speaking children's audience. I wonder if, because I'm free of that restriction, the more sophisticated tone and complicated underpinnings are coming through better? I definitely remember the fight scenes, and action scenes in general, being a lot more fun in Japanese than in the current published translations, but maybe English's requirement to be specific about a lot of these complex political and social situations is giving my translation a darker, sharper edge than Scholastic's? I don't know.
I don't think Hirano would want to do "Guardian of the God." It's much more violent than any of the others so far and I just translated a chapter with honest-to-god suicidal ideation; I wasn't about to pull any punches on that, because Uehashi doesn't, and I think cheapening or glossing over how characters are feeling wouldn't do readers any favors, even child readers. But I also don't know if it's something most children should be reading.
Traveler of the Blue Road also treads very turbulent emotional territory; I don't tend to think of it as a children's novel. I think Uehashi is a sort of big-tent writer that writes for everyone, and occasionally goes down some pretty dark paths. I'm reminded of Balsa wandering through the caves between New Yogo and Kanbal. Hyoulu hate fire, so she couldn't use any light to navigate. She had to find her way home in the dark. I think that's a good metaphor for this series.
In response to the earlier reply, the prison break was the first scene I wrote (even before the drama came out!) so it is nothing like canon, if the drama is accurate to canon. And now that I've read Void and after reading your comments I've had a plot bunny about Tarsan, so... we'll see?
I definitely feel like the Scholastic editions lack the nuance and complexity of the later books as you've translated them, with makes me think that the dumbing-down for American children is the culprit. I know entire scenes were cut (Balsa taking a bath in the hot spring, because American audiences evidently wouldn't "get" that?), but I'd have guessed those books were targeted toward maybe 4th or 5th graders? (Not that I know anything about children's reading levels.) I know that "YA" literature encompasses some pretty effed-up material, but the only "Children's" book I read where I felt a bit scarred after the fact was The Giver. So it's quite plausible Scholastic intentionally asked Hirano to temper the darkness. And they might have nixed the other translations once they realised how dark the series gets and how quickly. If you do decide to make your own translations of the first two books, it will certainly be interesting to see how they compare. I really enjoyed Guardian of the Darkness, but it's possible that story's just so compelling that it would be excellent in any form. I enjoyed the first book on my most recent readthrough, but the first time I read it, coming off my second or third watchthrough of the anime, I was really disappointed. IDK.
There's an entire longish chapter dedicated the the prison break in Traveler of the Blue Road, so it should have analogs to canon, anyway :)
The first book is definitely targeted to 4th-5th graders. I think that both Void and the Guardian of the God books are pitched a little higher, reading-level wise, and Blue Road is the hardest of the lot. I'm not cutting scenes (I have no editors and they can't make me :P ) so you'll be getting everything--at least, everything I can understand; there are sentences here and there that are unclear to me, but their context usually becomes clear a little further on. And I won't be toning things down for kids, either. I never appreciated being talked over or having complicated subjects danced around as a kid.
The character voices are a lot more individualized in the first two books than they come across as, I think. Uehashi's use of the third person is very close, and characters talk/describe things differently and have different attitudes toward their world. It's hard to balance personal style as a translator with the stylistic quirks of the work. Even I can't bring everything through that I want to, but I do think that my character voices are delineated better than characters in the first book, who tend to come off a little stilted sometimes. (A lot of them speak in the same way/tone, which surprised me after I read it again after reading it in Japanese.)
"The Giver" scarred me, too. I don't really classify it as a kid's book...at least not for kids younger than 12.
I'll get to the first two books eventually. :) I was going to use Hirano's translation to do a notes compare, but now I think I might try translating it blind (not having her translation to compare it directly to). It would take more discipline and effort but it might also be more interesting.
I'm glad I'm not the only person who was shocked at The Giver. I read it at like 15 or 16 and was *still* scarred. :/
It will be very interesting to return to the first books after reading the rest of the series. I'm curious if there are any little foreshadowy hints or anything that I missed. Certainly I appreciated the books more after I went in without expectations, but I do kinda think that the dumbing-down did the books a disservice. I'm pretty curious how different your take will be from Hirano's, so my vote is for translating it without referring to Hirano. XD
I read The Giver when I was ten. Ten! And I'm still not over it. Why is this extended metaphor for freedom vs. duty and facing death (or at least the effacement of the self) written for children!? The more you think about it, the more messed up it gets.
Balsa's character is very consistent throughout the books, but when I look at how Balsa talks about the Mountain King and her encounter with Jiguro in Guardian of the God, I think the Guardian of the Darkness translation may be missing something. Something subtle, but there. I've felt it before while reading that scene but (of course) I never translated it myself. We'll see if I can pin it down. I think Hirano nailed the closure that the scene provides, but that scene doesn't mark the end of Balsa's issues with Jiguro, her upbringing or herself. It's both an ending and a beginning, like the serpent biting its tail (which is the form the Mountain King takes).
There are times when I can't render a sentence perfectly, but I haven't had any problems figuring out Uehashi's ideas. And I see no reason to dumb things down. These books are fairly simple in style, but I like how well-thought out they are. :)
I'm even almost looking forward to Guardian of the Dream (which will probably be last) because I may find something in it that I couldn't see before. I decided to do translation specifically in year three of Japanese study partly to increase reading stamina and speed, but also to take in a lot of Japanese at a detailed, word-for-word level so that that some of the subtleties that still elude me start to make sense.
I'm not sure if there's foreshadowing in the first two books or not, but there definitely is in Guardian of the Dream. I also differ significantly in how I show Balsa and Tanda talking to each other because, thanks to watching dramas, I understand those differences just fine. Brief example: pronouns. Tanda uses omae for Balsa and Balsa uses an(a)ta for Tanda. The latter is what she would call him if he were actually her husband; the former is mildly respectful and creates a little distance, but can also be used disparagingly (you can direct an "omae" at the target of your frustration). There's a gentle playfulness to how they talk to each other that I don't always get from the first book. Tanda comes off as a bit too serious, and Balsa as a bit too aloof. Even when they fight in Guardian of the God, Tanda tries to slip in a joke to lighten the mood. :)
I thought the first book felt incomplete and it turns out that parts of it had been omitted for the English translation the whole time? I wonder how much of the book was left out.
Not much, really, just snippets here and there. The violence was definitely toned down, as were darker pieces of the plot (Mon goes into more detail about his first mission, for example). A scene that was originally written from a common person's perspective was given to Shuga. A scene of Balsa visiting a hot spring was omitted. Stuff like that.
The same is true of Guardian of the Darkness, incidentally. I'll be translating the first three books in the series at some point, but I can't offer them for distribution here. Maybe I'll do a comparison/analysis of the published versions vs. the Japanese ones. I can also share files individually as long as I'm not making any profit/depriving the author of money, so if you're curious about getting your hands on the first two books in their unadulterated form, let me know. Translating those is going to be part of phase 2, though (sometime in 2022).
WHAT there was more detail about Mon's background and they cut it!? Shock! Gasp! Indignation! How dare they deprive me of more Hunter canon?!
The fact that Balsa calls Tanda anata and Tanda calls her omae is quite interesting. That's one of those things I think gets lost in translation - the different forms of address in Japanese seem to be so important in knowing how characters think of each other. I didn't pay much attention to it originally, but as I was translating that manga I learned things (like that omae is rude, and kisama, and that Suyou's term for himself is the haughty one when he's introducing himself to Mayuna, and that moment in the same scene where Taiga is introducing Suyou and REALLY wanted to leave off the honorific: Oh yeah, this is Rakusuran Suyou........-dono. ) that add meaning. I really ought to sit down someday and bother learning the different ending forms; right now I can't tell keigo from normal polite, for example. Very interesting, though, and not easy to translate.
Dang, I was so sure that Rahan was on the ocean. >_<
ReplyDeleteNope. It isn't on the ocean in the drama, either.
DeleteEmperor Torugal's palace and Hoshiro harbor are, though, and Chagum goes there, too. Maybe that's why there's some confusion.
Since you're working on your Blue Road fic, it just occurred to me that part of my prework might be useful to you. (Why am I doing prework on Traveler of the Blue Road? Because I'm already done with the prework on the next Guardian of the God novel and am busily translating it, and I try to always stay one novel ahead on the logistical stuff so that I don't get overwhelmed. :) )
DeleteAnyway, here are the chapter titles from Traveler of the Blue Road:
Prologue: Waves from the South
Part 1: The Mikado and the Crown Prince
Chapter 1 - The Holy Sage’s Fate
Chapter 2 - Letter from the Sangal Kingdom
Chapter 3 - Bursting Open
Part 2: Sailing into a Trap
Chapter 1 - The Voyage
Chapter 2 - Islands Form a Net
Chapter 3 - The Prisoners at Night
Chapter 4 - The Prisoners Escape
Part 3: Chagum and the Hawk
Chapter 1 - Encounter
Chapter 2 - Purification
Chapter 3 - Stars in a Strange Sky
Chapter 4 - The Storm
Chapter 5 - In the Hawk’s Talons
Chapter 6 - Illumination
Part 4: Confrontation
Chapter 1 - Talsh Cavalry
Chapter 2 - A Grim Journey
Chapter 3 - Rain in the Imperial Capital
Chapter 4 - The Palace of the Poisonous Spider
Chapter 5 - Voices Crying Out
Chapter 6 - The World Above the Walls
Part 5: Traveler of the Blue Road
Chapter 1 - Golden Clouds
Chapter 2 - The Blue Road in the Moonlight
Nah, that would make too much sense. XD I think I just decided it somewhere along the way and failed to notice in the drama that the city was landlocked. This frequently happens to me while reading x y or z - I'll get an idea into my head very early on and then be shocked when I realise I got it completely wrong, even if the author never said even one thing to lead me to my original conclusion. The most egregious was when I read To Kill a Mockingbird as a child - I just decided that Atticus and Scout were Black, and when I realised 2/3 of the way through the book that they were white, I was flabbergasted. *facepalm*
ReplyDeleteMan, I need to read faster. XD I'm still mindblown by how fast you're translating these books. TBH I haven't touched my fanfic in a while, it's quite daunting and I'm trying to decide whether to try to bring it more in line with canon or not... I have to go back and read through it, and probably also re-watch the drama. Somehow that story's become far more intimidating since I decided to post it. >_<
I'm canonically picky when it comes to fanfic, so don't let my comments stop you or slow you down if that's not what *you* want. (Those comments were offered as information, not as criticism.) I've read incredible fics that tweak the worlds they're based on quite a bit and they've been damn good reads. The most important thing is what you want to say with your story, and what you want to explore. :)
DeleteI think Black Scout and Atticus would be an amazing twist on the story, but there's no way they'd let Atticus be a lawyer in that time period. :( Darn. I'd read *that* if it was a fanfic, though.
Actually, I know exactly why it became more intimidating: because now that I can actually read Uehashi's work, it's turned out to be even more nuanced, intelligent, and well-written than I expected, and that's a lot to live up to - that in fact can't be lived up to. It makes the idea of writing my own version of one of her stories seem silly. Kind of like when an artist does a cover version of a song that's already basically perfect. Even if the cover is fine, you're still like "but why though?" And if the cover is *really* inferior, then it's almost like an insult to the original version. That's what this feels like. Especially now that, in a few months, there will be an English translation of the book that I can read myself, removing the need for an English version of the story. *shrug* But, maybe after I've read it there will be reason to want a fix-it fic. LOL especially if Yun turns out to be a monster and/or gets left in Sangal to die or something. IDK.
ReplyDeleteEven if you think it's inferior, it's *yours*. It's your perspective and your ideas that were inspired out of love of canon. I think it's always the right choice to decide to care about something, even if it brings you some pain in the end. (I wouldn't be able to keep translating if I let my crippling insecurity slow me down...)
DeleteI definitely think there's room--a gracious amount, even--in "Traveler of the Blue Road" for expanded Hunter involvement. They spend a fair amount of time on ships and as prisoners that you could use for all kinds of shenanigans. (You could explore some standard tropes like seasickness, with the twist that they're only faking to get their own room, or have them cast running bets on how often one or the other of the crewmen gets piss-drunk and starts singing about nahji. The prison break could be a lot more elaborate and detailed. Maybe the Hunters have friends in Sangal, too?) You could also cut back to the other six Hunters at home playing poker and complaining that they weren't assigned to assassinate anyone fun.
I really like canon "Traveler of the Blue Road," but my enjoyment of it wouldn't diminish my enjoyment of a fic any less. I read fic because it builds on canon that I love; it doesn't need to mirror it exactly. :)
Sorry to put a bug in your ear about this, but I've been thinking about this comment for a couple of days. I read all of Cathy Hirano's public interviews on translating the Moribito series before I started all this, and she's said a few things about toning down certain aspects of the series for an English-speaking children's audience. I wonder if, because I'm free of that restriction, the more sophisticated tone and complicated underpinnings are coming through better? I definitely remember the fight scenes, and action scenes in general, being a lot more fun in Japanese than in the current published translations, but maybe English's requirement to be specific about a lot of these complex political and social situations is giving my translation a darker, sharper edge than Scholastic's? I don't know.
DeleteI don't think Hirano would want to do "Guardian of the God." It's much more violent than any of the others so far and I just translated a chapter with honest-to-god suicidal ideation; I wasn't about to pull any punches on that, because Uehashi doesn't, and I think cheapening or glossing over how characters are feeling wouldn't do readers any favors, even child readers. But I also don't know if it's something most children should be reading.
Traveler of the Blue Road also treads very turbulent emotional territory; I don't tend to think of it as a children's novel. I think Uehashi is a sort of big-tent writer that writes for everyone, and occasionally goes down some pretty dark paths. I'm reminded of Balsa wandering through the caves between New Yogo and Kanbal. Hyoulu hate fire, so she couldn't use any light to navigate. She had to find her way home in the dark. I think that's a good metaphor for this series.
In response to the earlier reply, the prison break was the first scene I wrote (even before the drama came out!) so it is nothing like canon, if the drama is accurate to canon. And now that I've read Void and after reading your comments I've had a plot bunny about Tarsan, so... we'll see?
DeleteI definitely feel like the Scholastic editions lack the nuance and complexity of the later books as you've translated them, with makes me think that the dumbing-down for American children is the culprit. I know entire scenes were cut (Balsa taking a bath in the hot spring, because American audiences evidently wouldn't "get" that?), but I'd have guessed those books were targeted toward maybe 4th or 5th graders? (Not that I know anything about children's reading levels.) I know that "YA" literature encompasses some pretty effed-up material, but the only "Children's" book I read where I felt a bit scarred after the fact was The Giver. So it's quite plausible Scholastic intentionally asked Hirano to temper the darkness. And they might have nixed the other translations once they realised how dark the series gets and how quickly. If you do decide to make your own translations of the first two books, it will certainly be interesting to see how they compare. I really enjoyed Guardian of the Darkness, but it's possible that story's just so compelling that it would be excellent in any form. I enjoyed the first book on my most recent readthrough, but the first time I read it, coming off my second or third watchthrough of the anime, I was really disappointed. IDK.
There's an entire longish chapter dedicated the the prison break in Traveler of the Blue Road, so it should have analogs to canon, anyway :)
DeleteThe first book is definitely targeted to 4th-5th graders. I think that both Void and the Guardian of the God books are pitched a little higher, reading-level wise, and Blue Road is the hardest of the lot. I'm not cutting scenes (I have no editors and they can't make me :P ) so you'll be getting everything--at least, everything I can understand; there are sentences here and there that are unclear to me, but their context usually becomes clear a little further on. And I won't be toning things down for kids, either. I never appreciated being talked over or having complicated subjects danced around as a kid.
The character voices are a lot more individualized in the first two books than they come across as, I think. Uehashi's use of the third person is very close, and characters talk/describe things differently and have different attitudes toward their world. It's hard to balance personal style as a translator with the stylistic quirks of the work. Even I can't bring everything through that I want to, but I do think that my character voices are delineated better than characters in the first book, who tend to come off a little stilted sometimes. (A lot of them speak in the same way/tone, which surprised me after I read it again after reading it in Japanese.)
"The Giver" scarred me, too. I don't really classify it as a kid's book...at least not for kids younger than 12.
I'll get to the first two books eventually. :) I was going to use Hirano's translation to do a notes compare, but now I think I might try translating it blind (not having her translation to compare it directly to). It would take more discipline and effort but it might also be more interesting.
I'm glad I'm not the only person who was shocked at The Giver. I read it at like 15 or 16 and was *still* scarred. :/
DeleteIt will be very interesting to return to the first books after reading the rest of the series. I'm curious if there are any little foreshadowy hints or anything that I missed. Certainly I appreciated the books more after I went in without expectations, but I do kinda think that the dumbing-down did the books a disservice. I'm pretty curious how different your take will be from Hirano's, so my vote is for translating it without referring to Hirano. XD
I read The Giver when I was ten. Ten! And I'm still not over it. Why is this extended metaphor for freedom vs. duty and facing death (or at least the effacement of the self) written for children!? The more you think about it, the more messed up it gets.
DeleteBalsa's character is very consistent throughout the books, but when I look at how Balsa talks about the Mountain King and her encounter with Jiguro in Guardian of the God, I think the Guardian of the Darkness translation may be missing something. Something subtle, but there. I've felt it before while reading that scene but (of course) I never translated it myself. We'll see if I can pin it down. I think Hirano nailed the closure that the scene provides, but that scene doesn't mark the end of Balsa's issues with Jiguro, her upbringing or herself. It's both an ending and a beginning, like the serpent biting its tail (which is the form the Mountain King takes).
There are times when I can't render a sentence perfectly, but I haven't had any problems figuring out Uehashi's ideas. And I see no reason to dumb things down. These books are fairly simple in style, but I like how well-thought out they are. :)
I'm even almost looking forward to Guardian of the Dream (which will probably be last) because I may find something in it that I couldn't see before. I decided to do translation specifically in year three of Japanese study partly to increase reading stamina and speed, but also to take in a lot of Japanese at a detailed, word-for-word level so that that some of the subtleties that still elude me start to make sense.
I'm not sure if there's foreshadowing in the first two books or not, but there definitely is in Guardian of the Dream. I also differ significantly in how I show Balsa and Tanda talking to each other because, thanks to watching dramas, I understand those differences just fine. Brief example: pronouns. Tanda uses omae for Balsa and Balsa uses an(a)ta for Tanda. The latter is what she would call him if he were actually her husband; the former is mildly respectful and creates a little distance, but can also be used disparagingly (you can direct an "omae" at the target of your frustration). There's a gentle playfulness to how they talk to each other that I don't always get from the first book. Tanda comes off as a bit too serious, and Balsa as a bit too aloof. Even when they fight in Guardian of the God, Tanda tries to slip in a joke to lighten the mood. :)
I thought the first book felt incomplete and it turns out that parts of it had been omitted for the English translation the whole time? I wonder how much of the book was left out.
DeleteNot much, really, just snippets here and there. The violence was definitely toned down, as were darker pieces of the plot (Mon goes into more detail about his first mission, for example). A scene that was originally written from a common person's perspective was given to Shuga. A scene of Balsa visiting a hot spring was omitted. Stuff like that.
DeleteThe same is true of Guardian of the Darkness, incidentally. I'll be translating the first three books in the series at some point, but I can't offer them for distribution here. Maybe I'll do a comparison/analysis of the published versions vs. the Japanese ones. I can also share files individually as long as I'm not making any profit/depriving the author of money, so if you're curious about getting your hands on the first two books in their unadulterated form, let me know. Translating those is going to be part of phase 2, though (sometime in 2022).
WHAT there was more detail about Mon's background and they cut it!? Shock! Gasp! Indignation! How dare they deprive me of more Hunter canon?!
DeleteThe fact that Balsa calls Tanda anata and Tanda calls her omae is quite interesting. That's one of those things I think gets lost in translation - the different forms of address in Japanese seem to be so important in knowing how characters think of each other. I didn't pay much attention to it originally, but as I was translating that manga I learned things (like that omae is rude, and kisama, and that Suyou's term for himself is the haughty one when he's introducing himself to Mayuna, and that moment in the same scene where Taiga is introducing Suyou and REALLY wanted to leave off the honorific: Oh yeah, this is Rakusuran Suyou........-dono. ) that add meaning. I really ought to sit down someday and bother learning the different ending forms; right now I can't tell keigo from normal polite, for example. Very interesting, though, and not easy to translate.
Well, to be fair...it's a liiittle dark for a children's book XD
DeleteAnd yeah, there's no way to bring everything through, so I mainly just focus on tone and hope for the best.