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Guin Saga to Resume 4 Years After Original Novelist's Passing
posted on by Egan Loo
The main story of Guin Saga, the "world's longest" epic novel series, will resume on November 8, four years after the passing of the original author Kaoru Kurimoto. Yū Godai will publish Volume 131 Parro no Ankoku (The Darkness of Parro) on that date, followed by Yume Yohino's Volume 132 Cylon no Banka (The Elegy of Cylon) in December. According to the Mainichi Shimbun paper's Mantan Web site, Kurimoto herself had hoped that someone would continue telling her fantasy story after her passing.
The heroic adventure story follows Guin, a leopard-headed warrior who does not know his own origin. The series has 33 million copies in circulation since Hayakawa Publishing printed the first volume in 1979.
The first 16 volumes inspired a television anime in 2009, but Kurimoto succumbed to pancreatic cancer in May of that year at the age of 56. Hayakawa published Volume 130 Mishiranu Ashita (A Fathomless Future) that December, and the series remained unfinished until now. That same December, Kurimoto received a special posthumous award from The Science Fiction & Fantasy Writers of Japan.
Godai made her debut in 1991 with Hajimari no Hane no Monogatari, which won the 4th Fantasia Novel Prize. Her works include Kikai-Jikake no Kamigami and Paracelsus no Musume. Yohino made her debut with The Guin Saga side story Shukumei no Hōkan (The Crown of Chaos) earlier this year.
According to Hayakawa, Kurimoto left behind the plots for five to six more volumes, but the two new novelists will continue the story after that.
Vertical published the first five Guin Saga novel volumes and Kazuaki Yanagisawa's manga adaptation of a side story in North America. Sentai Filmworks licensed the television anime series.
Image © Kaoru Kurimoto/Tenrō Production/Project Guin
