Lord of Mysteries: The Clown Part 2 - Vol. 2

I feel like even though I just finished reading this book, I have a hard time gathering my thoughts about this volume. It can basically be summed up as follows: Klein does his job at the Nighthawks, digests his potion, and spends his “free” time scheming with the Tarot Club and getting up to no good.

That doesn’t sound like a very interesting book, does it? Yet, I binged this book in a few days. Maybe because I’ve seen the anime already, I had fun reading and comparing it to what I’ve seen before. You can almost see the discussions the creative team for the anime must have had, such as “This character doesn’t contribute much to the plot, let’s cut them” (Poor Gawain), or “This idea is really funny, let’s animate this one!”. 

There must be some Leonard Mitchell fans on the anime team, because they took a brief aside from Klein and turned it into an entire scene (of him falling down the stairs quite ungracefully). I thought he was particularly flirty in the show, but he really is just like that. I didn’t really catch this from the show, but in the book it’s clear that Leonard manages to build a sense of trust with Klein as they divulge a little of their own secrets. 

I can see why people would complain about the adaptation though. While the show was quite action packed, the book explains in careful detail how Klein navigates cases with the Nighthawks and advances his own interests. Every small detail is builds up the mysterious atmosphere, and it sells not only how extraordinary the Nighthawks and other Beyonder institutions are, but also how vulnerable the regular folks of this world are. 

For example, one gruesome detail is how if a family is too poor to bury the dead, they may resort to dumping their body in the river. In this world, this has a secondary consequence of causing the dead to become resentful and become zombies, wraiths, etc. It makes sense, but it makes the situation even more tragic. 

I also quite appreciated the “slice of life” moments Klein has with his coworkers and family. Klein’s welcome dinner with the Nighthawks was a pleasant surprise, and I’m sad it wasn’t in the show: Leonard choosing to sit next to Klein just to steal his food is too funny. Only for Klein to to get hungry later and beg the captain for another plate, which he graciously agrees to. My heart just about melted!

There was some material that wasn’t in the 1st season of the anime in regards to the introduction of a new character, so that was fun to read. Hopefully he has more involvement in the next book, as he brings a lot to the Tarot Club dynamics. 

Another spoiler thought (Don’t read unless you’ve watched the 1st season of the anime or read all of “The Clown” in the webnovel): The gall of the design team to put Ince Zangwill RIGHT THERE on the cover of this book, is crazy. He’s hidden just well enough that you might not notice him on the cover, which is very fitting.

It’ll be another long wait until May for Volume 3, and I just can’t wait!