Title: The Last Azvisalokya

Author: MiiMiiRyouma

Genre: Urban Fantasy

Quick Summary: A bit baffling.

Thoughts:

I always try to take precautions when reviewing works from people with whom English is not their first language - not to be condescending or anything dickish like that, but because I honestly have no idea what books are wrote like in their language and where there is a bit of a.... clash? between formatting standards in their language and formatting standards in mine.

And that's where the crux of my issue with this book lies. There are issues all across the board in writing mechanics, but I'm having a hard time deciphering which of these are just wrong and which ones stem from how books are wrote in Arabic. And certainly, this author is more than capable of getting their point across in this book. Comprehension is not the issue here. But the author also felt the need to describe every single thing, and to elaborate on things that either need no elaboration or could wait. And my biggest bone to pick lies in the dialogue.

Draco clears their throat:

-"This is how it's formatted," says Draco, "with a dash before each line and normally some sort of proclamation that dialogue is beginning. Which is.... well, it isn't how dialogue is really formatted in English books. At least, not that I've seen."

But, again, I cannot tell if this is simply incorrect or a cultural gap. Regardless, though, whenever you're writing a book in a language, it's a good idea to also abide by that language's formatting guidelines. Just something to consider,

One thing I can concretely comment on is how this story begins. We have David Hades, an FBI agent at the start of this book, who has majorly messed up. He's killed some guy and is pulled into the office where he's basically fired and then..... threatened? There's some business man there whose proposition is basically "Do work for me or we'll put you in jail for killing someone" and look like.... you don't need to tell me that businessmen and law enforcement can be and are corrupt, but like... this doesn't seem too feasible? I don't know how getting fired from the FBI works but this entire section made me wrinkle up my nose. Other, less feasible things is that David's boss is also his childhood best friend? Talk about a small world. Plot is important here, but plot doesn't work if you set yourself into restraints which don't go along with it. And honestly I didn't get much further than this because I noticed the book is on hold for the time being. But what kind of work is this dude doing? We don't really know. He complains a lot in the conversation of not being people's dogs and then agrees because he thinks a lot about his wife but like. Being a private investigator? What's he going to do? Why's the FBI just like "sure you killed a guy and you probably know a lot but go along with this other dude it's fine" it's. Not fine. I'm still quite baffled.

On a related note, David's wife has a vision while they're on a date and the vision/angel thing tells her her unborn daughter is basically a chosen one and. I dunno maybe this is because I'm not religious but if I had a sudden vision telling me my kid is a chosen one and to go somewhere, I would do anything but what that vision said. I'd probably check myself into a mental hospital.

I think the other major issue is how stiff the writing is. There's so many awkward phrases and the first handful of paragraphs in the prelude had so many adjectives that my head kind of hurt. It's one thing to translate what you want to say over, but you also have to work to make sure it flows in this different language, too. And as it stands right now, it really... doesn't. I would strongly recommend this author, whenever they come back to translating this book into English, also think about getting an editor or someone who can help make the writing flow better.