JoJo no Kimyou na Bouken

It has come to the time where, at long last, all of the Jojo light novels have been translated to English (at least unofficially, through fan-effort).

Genesis of the Universe marks the first that I was able to complete, working chronologically from the beginning of the manga onward (with full knowledge of what had already been adapted into the anime up to Part 5).

For anyone attempting the same, I'll note that both the Jorge Joestar and the Over Heaven novels (taking place pre-Part 2 and during the events of Part 3) had elements mentioned for characters I knew to be main antagonists in both Parts 6 and 7, with special emphasis on "homework" needed on the Jorge Joestar novel because there are some original-works-character and extra-alternate-universe nonsense going on with that one too (which I'll go into further detail on for its own review), so I felt compelled to stop partway and wait until I reached those parts of the manga.

As for Genesis of the Universe, for anyone struggling to find an English translation, I found a source using the translator's Twitter account, to be downloaded in conjunction with Golden Heart, Golden Ring, and some odd fixed pages of the Stone Ocean manga. I appreciate the work done here especially considering the translations being cross-referenced with what is apparently the VERY poor translation job done for the Italian release. If I were to make a couple of changes, I would want to respell "Abdul's" name as "Avdol" and to use quotation marks for dialogue instead of "-", but at this point, I feel those are nitpicks. I linked below.
https://mobile.twitter.com/AzoreanEve/status/1184433069203316737

The actual stories contained therein are ok, and skippable for sure, but enjoyable all the same. Like otherwise noted, they are simply a couple more adventures against Stand users during the Egypt arc of Stardust Crusaders. The imagination for a couple of the origins and abilities I found impressive, and the artwork serves as adequate illustrations ranging from super-impressive manga work to a couple that perhaps looked more like sketches? It all averages out, honestly.

Overall, a few more chapters worth of villain-of-the-week that we didn't have before, just in the form of prose instead of manga. I say it's worth the read.

JoJo's Bizarre Adventure: The Genesis of Universe is for all intents and purposes exactly what it says to be: another two short encounters to add to the "stand of the week" formula of Stardust Crusaders manga. It doesn't really enhance the story or the characters in any way, but if you're just looking for more JoJo anything, this will work as your fix.

As mentioned, thanks to the episodic formula of most of the plot of Stardust Crusaders, this novel doesn't have it hard to find a place on the timeline to fit in without disrupting the main story. The problem I have with it is that it doesn't really feal like it was intended to fit in it canonically and feels more as just a fanfiction or at best as something out of anthology collection. It's usually the Jorge Joestar novel that gets called a fanfiction, but contrary to this popular judgement of it I disagree - the style of it's plot and storytelling fits really well with the crazier later parts of JoJo and overall with a little tweaking you'd have no problem to include it in a canon. While having no problem including it in the canon is also true for Genesis of Universe, it doesn't fit that much with it's plot. It's mostly minor details, but stuff like the names of not being named after tarot and not being a music reference either seems really odd (although the JoJo wiki argues that Dark Mirage stand is a reference to Mirage song by Tommy James, I'd call that quite a reach and probably not intention of the author of this novel). The stand abilities are also a bit too complicated for the Part 3 standards, this too adding to the odd, not belonging feeling. And keep in mind that this novel got published only a year after Stardust Crusaders manga ended, so it's not like it got influenced by the more tricky powers shown in later parts. The fight themselves also feel less interesting than those showed in the main story, but it's understandable as action is harder to portray in entertaining way in novel form.

On the other hand what I liked about it is that we get more of a backstory and information about motivations for the minor villains. Well, mainly for the first part, the villain of second part of this novel is more forgettable, but the first one even first one even got a description of how Dio earned his loyalty, which is information I always felt was missing with most of the regular minor villains from Part 3.

Overall it's the weakest JoJo novel I've read, but it's still a nice read if you need more JoJo content while waiting for another chapter of Jojolion.