- #1
Warning, spoilers ahead. The positive reviews and the overall premise of the novel intrigued me into reading the novel. By the first 8 chapters, I was frustrated and constantly sighing over what I was reading. It was as if the author had done massive amounts of research into cooking pastries, yet instead of writing a cooking book, the author chose to write a fantasy novel with the central topic being cooking. The novel reflects that. A great concept is ruined by inadequate writing by the author. The author cannot write dialogue between characters nor build their relationship... In hindsight, it seems like the author is sometimes writing the dialogue for us readers and not for the characters themselves. Our two main characters, Arnold and Tina, have very little substance to their 'first impressions' conversations. At chapter 1, our main character says to Tina, "Thank you, Tina. You do know that you don't have to go out with me, right? You work for Arnold family. Helping with these things aren't within your duties. You can just do houseworks inside the house. Shouldn't you return to the main village's mansion? It's inconvenient to be in this pioneering village, right?" Then we find out that they live together, cook for each other, with Tina cooking his daily meals and him cooking her sweets... And they sleep holding each other... Every day... For 3 years. Not only that, but our Male Lead makes enough money to straight out hire her for life. Then it's transparent that Tina isn't hiding her love for him at all. "This is because I'm not an existence who can become "a certain genius". The other servants desperately try to curry favors with my younger brother and avoid getting involved with me. Tina is the only one who actively reaches out to me."Rather than me, isn't it better to curry favor with my brother Yorg?""No way. I love Kurt-sama."Again, we find out that Arnold is an OP MC and he realizes that along with Tina's love for him. In hindsight, this dialogue seems to be for the readers with the author having no regard for the characters themselves. This is a cardinal sin in my view.A fellow reviewer, Iris Lazuki, said, "First the novel MC is not dense at all and he knows on what should his top priorities here and he's not also the arrogant type or low key type MC." This reviewer is wrong. On the surface, Arnold doesn't seem dense. He see's the love Tina has for him. He is making plans for his future and his dreams. He knows that he is powerful, and can kill his brother at any moment if he desires. That also means through sheer power, no one should be able to take away his village away from him... Then we find out that he could see his proficiencies with his all-seeing eyes. It took him 10 years... To train with a sword in which he has a S rank proficiency that he knew he had. 10. Years. That is a dense Main Character. In a world of Magic and Monsters... In which the Main Character clearly knows their danger towards him, he chose to risk his life, Tina's life, and his family's life to train in the spear. If our MC was an ignorant boy forced by his father to practice the spear, this would be acceptable. But we know that MC has reincarnated with his previous life's memories. Our MC is also intentionally negligent in awakening his Earth Element since he was able to see it within himself and had awoken it in a single day. The solution to awakening it was also simple. He's quite a dense character when it comes to his personal safety. Now I'm going to criticize the Authors use of forced tension. Arnold's brother is a joke of a character. "Forced", is how I would describe the Authors attempt at an antagonist and his dialogue. Again... There is no actual tension in the novel nor their fight. If the author had stuck to the happy, no tension slice of life type writing that seemed to suit this novel, I would have liked this novel. The use of Forced Tension ruined the novel in my opinion... And I can already foresee that there will be more cringe worthy moments of Forced Tension in the future. That said, I'll give this novel 3 stars for now. Why? Because the novel focuses on cooking. The vast majority of this novel is cooking. As I've previously stated, the Author has done a lot of research on cooking. The level of writing and detail increases tremendously when cooking comes into play. It also vastly increases my enjoyment of the novel. And while the dialogue is cliche and elementary, the premise still feels fresh (I'm only 20 chapters into the novel). That is enough for it to be 3 stars, and I have a feeling that it will feel generous as I continue further into the novel. I hope this review offsets the overwhelmingly positive reviews already written. This isn't an over 4.5/5 star rated novel. Thanks for reading my truthful review of Upstart Pastry Chef ~Territory Management of a Genius Patisserie~.