Title: Anima

Author: ZaineKellman

Genre: Mystery/Thriller

Quick Summary: I have copied you and made up myself...

Thoughts:

This feels like the literary equivalent of an inflatable pool. It's been inflated and it's set up, but there's no water in it yet. This is the start of what could be a wonderful and dark novel. I say "start" because thus far, it's only five chapters long, and truthfully there's not much aside from the inciting incident. It's nice to be excited about what COULD come... but that said I don't know WHAT is coming yet.

The only real character I have a sense of at the moment is the main one, Vincent. He doesn't stand out too terribly much for me versus other gruff-ish types of characters in these noir-style sorts of stories, though. I could probably pick out five other noir-style MCs that sound a lot like Vincent, I'm afraid. I'd love to have something other from his powers that makes him stand out. But that said, his powers are... interesting.

As for Jerrod, don't know what to make of him yet. He reminds me a lot of Shugo Makishima from Psycho-Pass - mostly in that he can commit crimes with it having absolutely no affect on his soul. That's the first place my mind went to. I'm curious to see how he and this issue of gang wars are related, let alone why he's causing all of this trouble to begin with. 

As for the plot itself... it's mostly hinging all on Jerrod. He's certainly a mystery. Again, I'm curious just what his deal is. Right now, Vincent and the readers know close to nothing about him... but we left off in a spot where it seems we might get some information. I'm hopeful.

The soul system has promise. So far all I really know is the darker your soul, the more fucked-up shit you've thought about doing or have done. Wonder what a saint's soul would look like, and how this all came to be...

Speaking of souls, I feel like at times the whole "this is impossible for Jerrod to be pure humanity is black and dark and yada yada" perhaps got hammered in a bit too strongly? It could be scaled back a touch. Especially in... I think chapter 4 or 5. It shifted from "noir" to "teenage angst" levels of going on about how dark the world is, you know?

There's not too terribly much I can say here, to be honest. The plot moved on the slower end of the spectrum, so there's not too much to dissect yet. I'd love to take another look at this when there's more of the book available.