Spy Classroom - Volume 8 - Chapter Aft

Afterword

The following contains spoilers for the main story. Please finish the book before reading.

I know the Volume 8 afterword isn’t the greatest place for it, but I hope you don’t mind if I take a moment to talk about my writing process for Volume 1.

I touched on it a bit in the Volume 1 afterword, but I wrote Spy Classroom by taking my winning entry to the 32nd Fantasia Taisho awards and completely rewriting over 95 percent of it.

That then begs the question, what was the sub-5 percent left over from the Fantasia Taisho era? I’ll tell you: it’s the idea of having one of the characters be a poison user, the fight on the boat, and Sara. I changed her name, but the character who was the model for “Meadow” Sara existed all the way back in the original manuscript. Personally speaking, I’ve known her for a longer time than I have Klaus or Lily.

That was why, back when I was writing the first volume, I decided that she would be the focus character for Volume 8. I knew she wouldn’t get much of the spotlight before then, so I made up for that by ensuring she would truly get a chance to shine at the end. I try to show all my characters the same amount of love, but the way I ended up showing Sara hers turned out a little funky.

While I’m on the subject, there’s another conversation from when I was writing Volume 1 that bears mentioning.

My original editor, O: “I’d love it if you could give each of the girls their own unique weapon.”

Takemachi: “I totally get that, but the first book is already chaotic enough as it is.”

After that discussion, I ended up putting it off all the way to the end of Volume 8. It finally showed up, Tomari! You gave it such a cool design back on the Volume 1 cover, so I felt terrible about not finding room for it in the books until now. Annette refused to build it, you see, and it took a ten whole books (including side story collections) to convince her…

Now, between the anime adaptation from Studio feel. and the concurrently running manga adaptations of Volumes 2 and 3, there’s a lot going on in the world of Spy Classroom, but as far as the novels go, we’re actually heading into the back half of the series now. I’m currently locking in my vision through to the final book, and I hope you’ll join me on the rest of the journey. I daresay our male lead might even get a focus book of his own at some point.

Before we get to Volume 9, though, I hope you don’t mind if I squeeze in Short Story Collection 3. The backlog of Dragon Magazine shorts is piling up, and this way, I’ll be able to share tidbits from the Avian honeymoon in a way I didn’t have room for in the main novels.

When we do get to Volume 9, though, it could very well herald a big change for Lamplight.

I’ll do my best to make sure it lives up to your expectations. Until then, that’s all from me.

Takemachi