Skip to main content

Wolfbreed by S Andrew Swann: AKA Elfen Lied The Novelization




I'm probably going to sound pretty harsh in my opinion about this book, but really, it was a very entertaining read, and I've not had a book for a long time that sucked me in like this one did, I literally spent every free moment turning it's pages until I was done, rather than watch TV, play video games, or read comics.

So, there you are, the one paragraph review. Here's a bit of a synopsis though, the story revolves around a female werewolf who has been captured by a sect of knights of the teutonic order during the time of the crusades, and been raised into their service as a weapon to defeat the pagan tribes of Prussia in order to bring them to the light Christianity (part of what makes this story so compelling is that I can readily believe that that would happen). The story kicks off with the werewolf, Lilly, escaping from the order when their leader is called away, and she's left in the care of a relatively inexperienced/uninformed group of knights. She breaks free, but not before taking a silver tipped crossbow bolt to the head, which grazes her skull, shortly thereafter she passes out in a stream, and reverts to human form, where she's found by a local boy. It's further revealed that either do to physical or emotional trauma, she's developed a split personality, one is innocent, emotionally and intellectually immature, barely even able to speak, and the other is the cold, rational killing machine created by the order.

So, let's stop right there. At this point, the story was sounding pretty damn familiar, and it took me a little bit to make the connection. It's the anime/manga Elfen Lied!

Just say she's a werewolf, and you're good.


Really, the opening of Elfen Lied is pretty much the same synopsis, just replace Prussia with modern Japan, werewolf with girl with telekinetic abilities, and silver tipped crossbow bolt with sniper round. They've even both got red hair! The only real difference is that in Elfen Lied the telekinetics are not being used as weapon, but just studied. The parallels don't stop there, but I don't want to go any further, for fear of ruining either story.

At first I just thought it was a coincidence, I mean, there are only so many stories, you're bound to come across a few that are more than a little similar. Until I looked through the acknowledgements (I admit, I typically skim over that section of a book) only to see that Swann calls out Elfen Lied saying it "heavily influenced" the creation of this novel.

I wouldn't go so far as to say that Wolfbreed is a ripoff of Elfen Lied, it's more of a homage, Swann's managed to take a lot of the premise and character of the anime, and put it in a different world and setting, and instead manged to tell an interesting tale of someone that many would label a monster, coming to terms with faith, redemption and acceptance.

Now I'm wanting to track down the Manga form of Elfen Lied to give it a read, since I've only seen the anime.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

A Return To My Brainstorming Days Of Old

Way back when, say, ten years ago, I had a dream of making a game. At first I wanted to make it a videogame like a JRPG (Final Fantasy, Dragon Warrior, etc.). Then it was going to be a pen and paper RPG (Dungeons and Dragons). And for many years, it kept bouncing around, back and forth between the two, I thought I was so very creative and clever. Eventually I started to realize that I was never going to be able to do anything like this on my own, and that neither I, nor any of my friends, had the time or energy to put into learning the necessary technical skills for a videogame, or simply the desire for a tabletop game. Still, I really liked brainstorming ways that different elements of a setting would interact with each other, whether it be a game system, a fantasy world, a system of government, or a military force. Sometimes I'd write this stuff down, but more often than not, I just day dreamed about it. I think it was kind of like therapy. I still wanted to do something wit

Lemme Tell You About The Transformer, Astrotrain, And Why He's My Favorite

       I am, quite obviously, a massive fan of Transformers, but I grew up in kind of a weird time for being a fan. Really, I'm just a LITTLE too young. I remember seeing my brother, who was six years older than I, get all of the coolest Transformers, and then by the time that I started being able to ask for Transformers for myself, the nature of Transformers had greatly changed. I have a great anecdotal story about him clipping Soundwave (arguably one of the coolest Transformers toys ever, which turned into a microcassette player) to his shorts and climbing a tree. He then proceeded to fall 30 feet out of that tree, and land on Soundwave, which poked him right in the kidney, and he peed blood for a week.        While I still have a great deal of fondness for them, Powermaster Optimus Prime is just not as cool of a toy as the original Optimus Prime. Notably, if you landed on Powermaster Optimus Prime, he probably wouldn't puncture your kidney, but the original Optimus Prime mig

The Worst Contact Allergic Reaction I've Ever Had

I'm started to feel like a bit of a freak show. I've of course been injured by shrapnel from a pipe bomb, and I've got impressive scars to prove it (side note: One of my friends said that I need to come up with a really awesome story to go along with my scar, and I sad "Someone throwing a pipe bomb at me isn't awesome enough?") I've mentioned that I took a first aid/CPR class in my first quarter of college, taught by Ron Hussman at Edmonds Community College. He was a great instructor, with a lot of great stories being a navy medic for 24 years, I think that's what he said. I'm proud to say that the pictures of my leg injury are now part of his curriculum, but I got tired of raising my hand every time he asked if someone had done something in particular. Called 911? Check Used an epipen? Check Been in shock? Check Ridden in an ambulance? Check Had burns in your throat? Check (seriously, don't let your kids hold roman candles while they fire) Lat