Welcome to all guys, girls, and enby friends! I watched Ascendance of a Bookworm in 2020 and immediately loved it. That being said, I strive for fairness in my reviews, so the overall rating I give to the anime may not be as high as I want. As usual with my reviews, I will be looking at 5 categories: Visuals, Story, Audio, Characters, and Personal Enjoyment. Each category will get a rating from 1 to 10. The average of these five scores will be the overall score for the series. Also note that the “story” category includes other elements such as themes, humor, pacing, and sometimes other things that don’t fit with the other categories. Let’s get started.

Note: I will spell the protagonist’s name as Myne, not Main or Mine

Also Note: The anime title will be shortened to Bookworm for this post

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Visuals: 5

First let me say that I am fond of the visuals in Bookworm. They look like a kid’s picture book and I like the bright colors, big eyes, and simple lines. However, there’s no getting around the fact that the style is very simple, lacking detail. The colors are sometimes too bright, and the proportions of the characters look “off” to me. The face expressions are often dull. The animation itself is a little bit choppy sometimes, and at other times, it switches to a style I don’t think fits in with the rest. The best example is when Myne is being attacked by the trombe vines. The animation used is different from the rest, but I don’t know enough about animation techniques to recognize what it is. It simply looks wrong.

The visuals that play during the opening and ending songs are unique and rather beautiful. For example, one of the EDs has art with birds and vines that I like. In addition, the cartoonish, chibi animation that is shown during some of Myne’s monologue is very cute. When she gets angry and expresses herself during these chibi shorts, it’s delightful. Furthermore, the illustrations at the endings of each episode are gorgeous. But despite some creativity of visuals during OPs and EDs, and even though I like the simplistic style, the visuals in Bookworm are still subpar. You can tell it’s lower budget.

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Story: 8

The story follows Myne, a girl who died in our world and was reincarnated into a fantasy world. That’s right: this is an Isekai anime. I generally don’t have a high opinion of this genre, but there are some important exceptions. Bookworm is one of them. Unlike most Isekai stories, this isn’t a male fantasy filled with big boobed elves and a world that revolves around the main character’s wishes. Our heroine is not a run-of-the-mill, lowkey misogynistic young man. Instead, it’s one very quirky girl who’s obsessed with books. Also, the narrative has never sexualized this character. For an Isekai, the premise is relatively original and highly entertaining.

The plot progression is slow and structured more like a slice-of-life than a typical fantasy or adventure story. Myne slowly becomes more capable in her world as she approaches her dream of making books. But as things continue, it becomes obvious that she needs to protect her life from the Devouring, the mana sickness that will kill her if she doesn’t get help from the nobles. (There’s also a couple of important subplots, such as Lutz finding out that Myne is from another world.) The pacing is good enough for a slice-of-life/fantasy anime, and I never stayed bored for longer than half an episode.

Season 1 ends with Myne facing off with the High Priest to advocate for a position as an apprentice priestess. The confrontation was intense for an otherwise calm story, and even had some violence. The sudden escalation was well-done and succeeded in creating suspense. The same can be said for the climax of the second season, where Myne is assaulted by a noble and then almost killed by wild, animate vines. I was honestly very worried, so the show again succeeded in getting me invested. The falling action and conclusion to the two seasons was quite satisfying and left room for a continuing story.

The world-building in this series is excellent. From magic to religion, from lifestyles of soldiers to nobles, and orphans and priests, there is just so much interesting information about how this world works. That is one of the major strengths of Bookworm.

Another important part of the story category is the content balance. For example, is there a balance of normal plot progression with other types of content like humor or romance? I think Bookworm does a pretty decent job with this. While there’s nothing outrageously hilarious, there is a fair share of light humor, mostly from Myne’s reactions. There are also occasionally some darker subplots where unusually serious topics are touched on. For instance, there is the starving orphans arc and the story of the attendant who was sexually assaulted and now fears men. The darker bits are well balanced with the hopefulness of the story and the light humor.

When I consider a story, I often look at what themes are present and how strong, interesting, or unifying they are. Bookworm is not a thematically strong show, and doesn’t feature any profound or original themes. There are some basic themes present like the importance of hard work, family, resourcefulness, and kindness. Other than that, there’s not much else. But while Bookworm is lacking on the field of serious themes, it has a different strength to offer: educational value.

There is immense educational value in Ascendance of a Bookworm. The show takes every opportunity to present information about reality without becoming over-the-top about it. There’s information about all manner of topics from book-making to other crafts to history to business. I learned a lot from watching. Besides Dr. Stone and maybe Spice and Wolf, this anime taught me more real facts than any other. I bumped up the score for this section from 7 to 8 because of the value of information and the fun ways it’s presented in Bookworm.

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Audio: 8

The audio components of Bookworm are as wonderful as the story components. First let’s look at the songs and music. Opening 1, “Masshiro” by Sumire Moroboshi, is a really nice song. The first ending song, “Kamikazari no Tenshi” by Megumi Nakajima, isn’t my style at all, but it’s pretty in its own way. The second intro song is “Tsumujikaze” by Sumire Moroboshi, and love it even more than the first opening.

“Ephemera wo Atsumete” is the second outro song, performed by Minori Suzuki. This is possibly my favorite of the four songs. All these songs feel uplifting and positive, but the second ED is more peaceful and soothing. As for the instrumental OST, it’s mostly chill and relaxing, great for BGM. some of them sound very castle-timey. The OST tracks for seasons 1 and 2 are numbered and not named. Some of my favorites from the first season were Themes 2, 3, 6, 9, 10, 12, and 15.

Now let’s move on to the voice acting. Overall, while there were no especially stunning performances, it was still more than adequate. Yuka Iguchi plays Myne and does a terrific job with her lively role. She is a talented voice actress who has experience acting in main and supporting roles in many other anime series. I know her mostly because she played Krusch in Re: Zero.

Another main cast member is Show Hayami, voice of Head Priest Ferdinand. He has an amazing and characteristically deep voice. He is known for his ability to play villains, antiheroes, and serious, sanctimonious characters. Kotomine Kirei from the Fate series and Alucard from Hellsing Ultimate are examples. It’s a little bit strange listening to Hayami playing a relatively gentle and noble character like Ferdinand. Somehow, however, he makes it work perfectly. Other voice actors work mentioning for their excellent performances are: Takehito Koyasu (Benno), Mutsumi Tamura (Lutz), Karino Shou (Fran), and Chiyo Tomaru (Delia). With excellent music, along with good voice acting, the audio category earns an 8.

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Characters: 7

The characters in Bookworm are good enough to be entertaining. However, they never get past a certain level of depth. They all have fairly simple concepts, and don’t really go beyond that. They also have little emotional or psychological development; their development instead is focused on what strides they make toward their job goals. A good example is Lutz. He’s the best friend of Myne who wants to become a business man/ merchant. He has a short arc where he runs away from home, but otherwise stays much the same, working steadily toward his goals and becoming slowly more mature and educated. It’s still character development; it’s just mostly surface-level.

Besides being a bit limited in their scope, the characters are likeable and distinct. They may not be the most memorable, but at least you won’t have trouble telling them apart. In a way, they feel like real people. We don’t get to see a lot of their deeper development because everything is seen through the eyes of Myne, who only knows them from a certain social distance. My favorite supporting characters were most of the attendants, such as Fran and Gil, along with Frida and Benno. Their personalities, interactions, and reactions are entertaining and/or interesting to me. Of the main characters, I appreciate Ferdinand and Lutz equally. But even more than them, my favorite is Myne. Let’s talk about her.

Myne is an unusual and highly entertaining character. Her expressiveness, enthusiasm, and love of books are adorable. Her confidence and knowledgeable, resourceful mind are admirable. But there’s something else besides just that I love about Myne. She is largely driven by self-interest. In most anime with leading female characters, we have girls who are selfless, timid, and sort of spacey. Myne is quite the opposite: outspoken and efficiently-minded, with a healthy and believable level of selfishness. I’m not saying Myne isn’t a caring person, because she certainly can be. Her love for her new family and Lutz is one of her strongest qualities. That being said, if there’s no significant benefit in helping others outside this circle, Myne won’t waste time or resources in an effort to help.

In different post, I had a little more to say about Myne. I’ll quote myself here. “Myne’s personality isn’t exactly the most likable, but I enjoy it. Moreover, I appreciate seeing an isekai anime with such an unusual protagonist. One interesting case is when Myne decides to help the orphans at the Church. They were living in horrible conditions and some were starving to death. Myne fainted at the sight of a half-dead, almost skeletal girl lying on the floor in the dark. It’s unusual for Myne to go out of her way to change things unless there is a benefit to her. So when the Head Priest asks why Myne wants to help, she explains that she just wants to read her books without being distracted by guilt. I found this highly amusing.”

Due to the unusual and refreshing nature of Myne’s personality, I believe the character category for Bookworm deserves a score of seven at least.

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Personal Enjoyment: 8

This section will be a little repetitive, since I’ve already mentioned a lot of the aspects I enjoyed most in Bookworm. But let me review. I love the character of Myne, from her humorous reactions and expressions to her industrious personality and keen mind. She is improving not just her life but the lives of many others as she makes her dreams bear fruit. I also like other cute characters like Tuuli, Frida, and Gil. I enjoyed the OST, songs, and the voices of Yuka Iguchi and Show Hayami. The visuals, while not great, were definitely wonderful for me. The colors, the style, and the special illustrations are great.

Other enjoyable elements include the show’s educational value, the excellent and interesting fantasy world-building, and the positive, hopeful feel of the show. Myne has a lot of struggles, and sometimes her very life or the lives of her family are in danger. She’s at a disadvantage in almost every way. But still, she finds ways to make it work, as her family and friends support her every step of the way. It’s truly inspiring. I really enjoyed the hell out of this anime, so it easily earns a score of 8.

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Overall Score: 7.2/10.0

I’m quite happy with the overall score for Ascendance of a Bookworm. I think it’s balanced between realistic criticism and my high level of personal enjoyment. I recommend watching Bookworm if you want to watch an unusual isekai with a female main character and a hopeful, upbeat vibe. Thanks so much for reading and have a great day.

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This post first appeared on my Wix blog, Mono’s Anime Rants, on Aug 21 2022. After re-publishing it here on WordPress, I will delete the original to avoid confusion.

Thank you for reading~