THE APOTHECARY DIARIES
STATUS
RELEASING
VOLUMES
Not Available
RELEASE
August 29, 2014
CHAPTERS
Not Available
DESCRIPTION
In the East is a land ruled by an emperor, whose consorts and serving women live in a sprawling complex known as the hougong, the rear palace. Maomao, an unassuming girl raised in an unassuming town by her apothecary father, never imagined the rear palace would have anything to do with her—until she was kidnapped and sold into service there.
Though she looks ordinary, Maomao has a quick wit, a sharp mind, and an extensive knowledge of medicine. That's her secret, until she encounters a resident of the palace at least as perceptive as she is: the head eunuch, Jinshi. He sees through Maomao's façade and makes her a lady-in-waiting to none other than the Emperor's favorite consort... so she can taste the lady's food for poison!
(Source: J-Novel Club)
CAST
Maomao
Jinshi
Rouran
Gyokuyou
Gaoshun
Rifa
Lakan
Aaduo
Xiaolan
Lihaku
Pairin
Riishu
Meimei
Ruomen
Suirei
Joka
Lahan
Fenshen
Hongniang
Yarite Baba
Yinghua
Fuyou
Lingli
Koutei
Guen
CHAPTERS
RELATED TO THE APOTHECARY DIARIES
MANGA Slice of LifeThe Apothecary Diaries: Xiaolan’s Story
REVIEWS
Rastrelly
It might not be the best thing in the universe, but in my little world it's among those. A true masterpiece.Continue on AniListAh! One thing I wouldn't expect is to see exactly zero Apothecary Diaries light novel reviews under the hood. I actually did not rush to write anything on subject matter mostly due to, like with the anime version, there'd be like 200 texts covering every possible opinion, both those I like and incorrect ones.
Yet, here we are where we are at the moment of us being here!
I don't think I can be confused for an objective guy I am, but if dear reader would catch such an outrageous idea, I'm happy to stand him into corrected position. I am subjective even on the International Day of Objectivity, but today I'm more subjective than the subject monologuing the subject of this review.
Hoh, I'm not even going to pretend that I'll waste time searching for flaws or anything of the kind! Here goes the unholy glazing!
This thing we talk here of I love. The reasons for this situation are widely spread across a huge set of reasons.
The Apothecary Diaries (AD) is, at the moment, a series of 17 light novels, written by the one and only anthropomorphic hog, known as Hyuga Natsu, which is a citrus fruit from Miyazaki prefecture. As far as I'm aware it all started (and still goes on) as a web novel, later packed into a singular novel, afterwards repackaged into a series of LNs, followed up by two separate manga, a spinoff manga, anime series, and upcoming movie and live-action movie. AD is quite a phenomenon - and, for a change, I'm on the bandwagon! Yay!
MILD SPOILERS FOR EARLIER NOVELS ARE INEVITABLE! WE'RE TALKING ALMOST 15 YEARS OF STORIES HERE!
In common Internet consensus this is a hybrid of mystery, romance and comedy, but I disagree. Not that those things aren't there, but in my disturbed inter-ear nervous gangly I'd mark this as a fantasy historic thriller. Not fantasy in the meaning of rainbow unicorns, wizards and battle maidens (though there's at least one included), but the fantasy of well-crafted historical fiction of a fictional world.
To setup the stage: the Empire of Li. A large Empire on the far East, very China, much Japan (the author deliberately mixed in some elements of both, but Chinese aesthetic dominates in most cases). Year roughly 1600. Shakespeare (whose dark phantom personally invades LN6), flintlock pistols, European-style ships with cannons becoming available to Eastern Empire. Yet the decorations, politics and institutions are closer to the Tang era (which is roughly in the 900s).
The Emperor of Li rules from the Forbidden City. He has a layered harem with a bunch of concubines, several provinces to govern, cunning neighbours and vassals.
An apothecary girl called Maomao lives in the Capital. She's no father, raised by the high-ranking courtesans of a prestigious brothel and an exiled doctor running a pharmacy shop. She lives in poverty, malnourished, petite, traumatised, yet persistent in her aspirations. Yet, one day she gets kidnapped by some villagers, sold off and later introduced to the Imperial Palace as a servant labour and a daughter of an extended merchant family. Considering getting a job at the Palace would be a prestigious offer, she's making her "family" a nice coin, yet she wants to serve her term and run off as soon as she's out from the Palace grounds.
The next 16 books happen afterwards.
Yes, as many agree, one of the core appeal factors of the series is the protagonist - Maomao. However, by LN6 or 7 it's hard to call her "the main character". She often is the observer, the commenter and the psychoemotional filter of the events, even when dragged into the middle of some pretty big conundrums. And this is why I set AD on the pedestal. It is not a superhero show about the girl with medical superpowers. As soon as actual professionals come to the forefront, Maomao immediately gets overshadowed. Not humiliated, mind you - but she's a herbalist, not a physician. Neither she's a spy, a warrior, nor is she a politician.
Maomao is a good, kindhearted girl with strong principles. And she will likely attempt a murder if you find out. She hides behind a cynical, non-caring, cold facade, a result of an extremely traumatic childhood. She has a keen sense of moral smell, and as such she's disgusted by cruelty, waste, negligence; at the same time she's attracted to responsibility, competence, reliability, decisiveness.
She's both socially smart; she can be manipulative, she can try playing systems in her favour, she's not incorruptible - after all, years and years of poverty and hunger, abuse, stalking and neglect'd leave their mark on anyone. She'll demand payment, she'll grumble at you, she'll try to find excuses, but, after all, just like her oyaji, she'll go and help those in need knowing pretty well she won't be rewarded. She'll stick out her head towards a whip to protect a child she designated a "little shit". She'll sabotage a banquet while "undercover" in a bandit's hideout. She'll be afraid to the ends of her toes, but she won't back down.
There's a reason her arm is scarred by her own experiments, she ate every poison and contracted every disease she reasonably could - she hates her mother, yeah, of course.
There's not a thing Maomao cannot defend against via the Great Wall of Denial. She'll calculate a huge political conspiracy in her head, say NNNOPE and fully convince herself nothing's happened. You'd literally need to shove a frog in her face to make her admit that croaking is not a figment of her imagination.
...cross that out of your mental render.
Yep, profiling Maomao is a game in of itself. She's as willing to become a reliable friend to someone, as she's unwilling to accept it.
This quality of digging into the written material is prevalent across the series. As much as well-built Maomao is, the people around her are similarly well developed. The prime subject, of course, is Jinshi, the most obvious hidden prince in history. Well, hidden until he no longer is.
Maomao and Jinshi's romance is, of course, the "romance" part of the series. By the end of LN4 it's overall obvious they do love each other. Before that - the relation is a bit more one-sided. He falls for one of the few people in the palace who doesn't see him as an object of desire. Does Maomao not see how hot of a stallion the "celestial nymph" Jinshi is? Of course she does. It's the first thing she comments on him. But she's more annoyed about it than attracted.
Jinshi, a.k.a. Ka Zuigetsu, is the son of current Emperor; yet everyone, including himself, think he's Emperor's young brother. Whatever the case, he's pressured into the Imperial service. And - he might be childish at times, even vulgar; yet he's a responsible person, careful to fulfil his duty to the Empire and the dynasty in full. And when Maomao starts parsing this part of him, she finally starts falling for him.
Jinshi is also broken by what he lives in though - his "nymph mode" is a mask he's trained himself to wear, and this is what Maomao hates about him the most. Jinshi himself is tired of it, but even after his position becomes official oficially, this mask remains a part of him. One does not just drop his sword on the battlefield, doesn't he?
We are hinted on reality of Jinshi's position since chapter one, Maomao guesses it all by the end of LN1, and - of course, the Great Wall of Denial activates!
When truth of the situation does come to light, Maomao's technical status is higher than it has ever been, but the distance between her and her second half is wider than ever, and Maomao never forgets about it.
Maomao is not an angel, though. Unlike some other characters, she can hate. She can hate. let me tell you how she can hate. If the word HATE was written on each of seven billion nanoangstroms... Er.. What was I taking about? Ah, yes!
The series is very well balanced emotionally. It's not always funny, though it can get hysterically ridiculous. But it can shatter your faith in humanity as well. Warmongering. Betrayal. Institutionalised abuse, paedophilia, manipulation, murder. The series is extremely human. And, as a result, while there can be happy ends, some ends are extremely unhappy. People are miserable, lazy, cruel, - in most cases, not because they're evil, or baaad, - but because they exist in a system that naturally makes the persons to thrive within them to see such worldview as fully natural. And almost always even the worst piece of human trash is still what it is - a human. Most people aren't devoid of empathy, or feelings, or sympathy. Their behaviour patterns are learned. They can sincerely see their actions as necessary evil, have faith, or just be forced to do what they do by blackmail or dire circumstances; but sometimes they are plain venomous. And it's often impossible to outright tell one from another.
The cast of the series is huge. No, it's humongous. Some characters are there since LN1, others appear later but become essential to the Maomao's worldview. Some friends go away, some arrive later. But all key players are people, not just materialised archetypes or walking jokes, even the ones pretending to be as such, like Lahan's Brother. (who's Lahan? who knows? I don't. never met 'em.)
Interpersonal relations are almost never rushed. People don't befriend or hate each other on a whim. Especially when they are not superheroes written for teenagers.
You know what I always respect the most in fiction, when said fiction involves state level entities? The understanding of the power of systems. State level systems, such as institutions, organisations, religious cults, clans and factions, they are so much more than a single tiny human. Because they are made of a multitude of other tiny humans. These humans make up a vector of application for those organisations. A state is not fully subservient to the Emperor, however powerful, revered and influential he is. Are the military higher-ups willing to back him up in crisis, or the army at large will ignore his will? What about the nobles? How much power do they have? Can they collectively, or even individually, overrule the Emperor? Where do the money come to the imperial treasury - and who also gets a cut? Who except the state can project power via military, or via economy? Do the outreaches of the Empire properly inform the Center of their status, and is the Center able to verify the true state of affairs? What about the international situation? What if a foreign power was to take over a region by inciting an uprising, financing it? AD does understand this. There's nothing five involved people can do to beat a natural disaster. One girl will not stop a rebellion.
And the good old bony gentleman with a scythe can come after anyone - at any time, whether their time has come, or someone decided to move the clock's arrows.
This is a series of LNs about a gremlin girl who likes poisons. This is a revenge story about a boy who lost his future. This is a legend of a villainess who tried to kill the prince, the Emperor and take over the Empire. This is a take of an insect plague, bandits and the power of faith. This is a thriller about the sickness flowing through the veins of heavens manifest.
What the story also does repeatedly (and, somehow, each time unexpectedly enough) is the recontextualization of entities in the story. The most known case is Lakan's identity. The story falls out of its pants to draw the dude as a threat, potential traitor, supposed rapist, unhinged nagger, a serial stalker who might've infected a woman with syphilis and did whatever to his own parents. But then comes the reveal - that this is the image he bred himself for himself. That his nagging and stalking are the result of clumsy attempts at parenting his beloved daughter (whom he, with the power he has, could get onto his hands easily long time ago - yet he respected both her, her father and even the brothel she was attached to). That in this entire story with the ill courtesan he's the one who was just one of the victims of circumstances, yet he put the most blame on himself. And Maomao knows all that - and still despises him. And similar patterns happen around several characters, each times in a different way, but making the reader rework their mental image of an entire multitude of events, statements and relations.
AD is not some random LNs lost in meta, in tropes, in typicals. There are tropes. There are meta elements. But those are completely overwhelmed by the level of care and dedication to both art and craft on display. AD can get horrifyingly immersive while managing to throw in a joke or two. It goes far beyond the mystery, the romance or any genre framework, while never losing the unique feeling of "self". I love this thing, it makes me a happy little me.
COMMENTS
0 Comments
SIMILAR MANGAS YOU MAY LIKE
NOVEL FantasyIsekai Yakkyoku
SCORE
- (4.4/5)
TRAILER
MORE INFO
Trending Level 1
Favorited by 1,341 Users