When I started to read the translation of the Haruhi Suzumiya books, I found myself liking the style of narration. Kyon's sarcastic, deadpan cynic tone added a lot to the humor, and contrasted nicely with all the genki women surrounding him (with the exception of Yuki). He never seemed very proactive, except by force - at least at first.

Then I discovered that this is actually the default narrator setting in Japanese light novels.

Del Rey's Zaregoto series began in August, and I did enjoy the first book a lot. The lead is sort of a less-sarcastic Kyon, but far more cynical, and it's actually quite refreshing to have everyone call him on it over the course of the book. (I understand that's actually the entire point of the series of 9 novels, to make him proactive).

Then I read Faust. Now, I thought the stories in Faust were very well written, with one or two exceptions. But my god, the emotionally distant narration! All in a row! It made me want to cry. Watanuki, OK, he gets to be a little more active. Though less so than the anime and manga. And Drill Hole in My Brain benefited from being so utterly fucked up that it didn't matter how emotionally distant anyone was.

But F-Sensei's Pocket, which succeeded despite its narration by virtue of its premise, suffered from the narration problem. And Outlandos d'Amour, besides making me wonder if the author thought the whole thing up after listening to Can't Stand Losing You, suffered from two totally blank pages marrying each other and being the focus. And The Garden of Sinners was simply bad, with three interlocking narrators, all disassociated with anything resembling emotion, and all in a story that even if it had made sense I doubt I'd like it.

Now, to be fair, a great deal of this might simply be because of translation. It's always awkward going from one idiom to another. And god knows most Japanese are naturally more emotionally reserved than those of us in the West. But I also think this is a very common trend in light novels, judging from other translations I've seen on Baka-Tsuki and elsewhere.

It's also made me realize how proactive Kyon really is in comparison. :)