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There're some Mamoru Oshii book lists on the Internet, but they don't have detailed explanations about the contents. My Mamoru Oshii book collection is far from complete, but I'd like to write some short summaries for each of those books.
I apologize in advance for grammatical errors and misinformation.
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title: 獣たちの夜 BLOOD THE LAST VAMPIRE
(Night of the Beasts: BLOOD THE LAST VAMPIRE)
release: 11/01/2000 (reprinted on 07/10/2002)
publisher: Fujimi Shobo (reprinted by Kadokawa Shoten)
[contents]
Recognition
Organization
Maneuver
Partei
Gewalt
Sokatsu
[review]
Night of the Beasts is a spin-off novel based on BLOOD THE LAST VAMPIRE. It is Oshii's second novel.
It was already translated into English apparently, so I don't have much to say about it.
Let me explain the background of the series.
BLOOD THE LAST VAMPIRE started from Production IG's education program called Oshii-juku. Production IG had increased productivity, so they wanted to develop planning and scriptwriting resources for their original IP. Producer Ishikawa asked Oshii to educate young creators. Oshii already knew that a school-like teaching method doesn't work at all, so he started developing the actual anime project from the beginning.
About 10 people joined the program. Oshii gave a different theme to the students in each session, like "Hitler", "dogs", "a neighbor lady", and "family". After checking the texts and visuals of the document, he gave them scores.
When they were working on the "vampire" theme, Production IG decided to make a feature film based on their projects. Ishikawa asked Oshii to submit one project, so he mixed Kenji Kamiyama's idea and Junichi Fujisaki's idea. Kamiyama's world settings and Fujisaki's characters were merged into one project. Hiroyuki Kitakubo was chosen as a director because he joined Oshii-juku as an "advisor".
Oshii thought Kamiyama's script had a problem. However, Kitakubo convinced Oshii saying he's going to fix the problem. Oshii left the project after that. When Oshii first watched the film at the premiere, he realized that the script problem was not fixed at all.
Oshii gathered members and analyzed the film's problem. He was glad that Production IG managed to gain some merits from Oshii-juku, but he was unsatisfied with the film.
(Those stories are included in PERSONA enlarged version and COMPLETE WORKS Remix.)
That's the background of the BLOOD project. Before Oshii started making Avalon, he wrote the novelized version. Oshii made his version of Sayoko's story. He was still trying to write normal light novels in those days, so it is recommendable even to normal anime fans. (Later, his novels became cult items for enthusiasts.)
Unlike the original film, the novel version is based on Oshii's new-left movement experience. The protagonist is a high school boy called Rei Miwa. When you find a character called Rei in Oshii's fiction, it is Oshii's persona. Rei Maruwa was Oshii's other name in his early works, so he sometimes put characters called Rei. (Rei Maru-wa, all those three characters mean zero or circle, so it means OOO. Like XXX, it's an Alan Smithee-type name. BTW, the main villain of TNG Patlabor is called Rei Haibara, but that Rei is a woman. It reminds us of Oshii's remarks about the poltergeist. The spiritual gaze at him has a woman’s face, but she also looks like Oshii himself. It vaguely suggests that Rei Haibara is a variation of Oshii's <girl> symbols, like the red girl from The Red Spectacles.) Since Miwa belongs to the new-left movement, he gets into conflict with teachers and his parents. During the protest movement, he meets a weird monster and a highschool girl who slays the monster.
Some fans already know about Oshii's new-left experience and its impact on his anime. In this novel, Oshii honestly talks about that experience in the fictional form. Oshii himself once said that it was a bit tough to write about his own life.
It also includes another interesting theme: In the later works like Zombie Diary, Oshii came to depict the theme of "corpse". That was partly inspired by his sister's dance theme. Like dolls, corpses are purer than human beings because they lack intelligence and ego. He came to deal with the cultural aspects of corpses. If you marathon Oshii's works, you will realize that this novel is an important piece of Oshii's filmography/bibliography. That corpse theme is connected to Seraphim as well.
Plus, the food scene is important for Mamoru Oshii fans. Some reviewers curiously ignore this point, but Oshii has consistently depicted food in his anime/films. Soba is his icon, but he shows so many other foods. In the audio commentary of Beautiful Dreamer, he complained about the okonomi-yaki scene. Oshii ordered "Surpass Jarinko Chie" to animators, but he was disappointed at the result. Food scenes give a sense of vitality to Oshii's fiction, and Oshii himself knows that.
In this novel, the protagonist and other high school boys eat a lot of yakiniku-steak while a detective talks about corpses and vampires. That contrast is already funny and interesting. The food scene itself is well-depicted as well. When you read or re-watch Oshii's works, I recommend checking food scenes.
(Oshii says he loves Haruhiko Oyabu’s novels. He mentioned that he loves details of food in Oyabu’s novels are very important. He says the same thing about old Japanese films. Old Japanese films have a lot of food scenes. Those scenes influenced Oshii’s taste in the old days.)
