Solitary Lady

Solitary Lady is an engrossing Otome story on the titular revenge story encompassing her eight lives. The tale consists of four families holding onto their seasonal themed powers that are gatekept with their bloodlines. The hook of the story is something that’ll quickly set things up and not waste time, competently juggling all of our Lady’s past attempts at life, spreading them throughout the story. It’s arguably challenging to keep track of it at first, but it’s more than a welcomed sight at other stories that saunter and loiter round’ the meat of things. And in that spirit–! I’m dumbfounded at the sheer non-existent readership andcontemporary reviews that have yet not finished this manwha. The complete unknowability of the story shocks me to no end. The general reviews are a bit lacking at the moment so I hope to inspire more reviews to be written ‘bout it for when you’ve read the manwha or if you’ve already done so. Anyways, I want to stress that there’s been two seasons or break off points that happen due to a hiatus and it’ll be apparent that there’s an artist change. Point being is that it’s not a downgrade or ugly falloff. Rather it’s a different style which in its penultimate chapter titled “Solitude” has one of the best panels. The smooth composition, namely with our protagonist’s hair overflowing into a “S” shape interweaving within itself with a contrast of a dark sky painting the scene. Grace running and composing a beautiful scene of her journey. I have to admit. I cried at the end of the chapter’s finale And I wish for you to experience it. There’s some problems or avenues that I feel it could've explored or even capitalized on. Such as the outside world. Mainly with foregoing the world building for it; instead of giving us a concrete view they opt for plain dialogues of: “starvation and instability are present.” We’re told and not shown. Instead. The posh four family’s squabble to further gatekeep their frivolous power takes precedence which is understandable. While the other nobles try to get their piece of the pie making for an ok conflict. But at the end the motive felt empty since we didn’t really see their struggle beyond boot licking their relatives with superpowers. Still I’m hella impressed how they managed to secretly portray one of the main themes of the story. That’s revealed in the climax. You see it. The foreshadowing. How it’s laid throughout and interwoven in every character’s struggle. A reflection to behold. Seeing how it recontextualizes some downfalls that seem natural at first. Then rethinking these as curses and even karma. How these tragedies are affecting all of our main cast. For example, the romance which made me cry perfectly encompasses it, Though I don’t want to get into the why or I’ll ruin the surprise. Which is another thing. It blossoms somewhat late into the story and… it might even seem weird. That’s until it throws a guttural punch. Showing how it obfuscates our Protagonist’s; Hilise’s goal. Really entrenching and burrowing us further into the conflict. All in all I might be a Hag-Maxxer coming out of this. I’ve never felt such envy towards a protagonist stepping on an old granny. Along with it being a gripping story that entertains beautifully, even if it isn’t perfect. Finally I thank Nhovah, my fellow friend who recommended this story. Along with AlexD who binged all of it after I cattaloged it on MAL, presumably skipping his sleep. Inspiring me to finish my reading, which took 2 months. Still, they made this review possible, so I give out my gratitude to them. And you for reading.