Not Your Typical Reincarnation Story
by Lemon Frog , A-jin
published by Webtoon (55 chapters, ongoing)
2023 – present
Dislcosure: it is a reincarnation story, if you were wondering. But it’s an interesting one.
Suna Choi gets murdered in the contemporary/real world, and wakes up as a villainess in a novel she read before she died. While Edith Rigelhof as a villainess is glamorous, seductive, and famous redhead, Suna realizes that Edith is also completely doomed. No one is on her side. She has no friends, no support, and is unlikely to survive the well-intentioned character’s shoddy investigations into things she is accused of. As so many contemporary heroines do, Suna decides she will take control of the story by turning Edith’s life around, and will live to have a happy ending.
In these respects, this story DOES have much in common with other reincarnation manhwa.
Yet… Suna/Edith can’t tell the other characters how badly Edith is abused at home. She can’t reveal any of her secrets or plans, or she loses consciousness. Also, she learns in flashbacks to a place between her world and that of the novel that she is the 13th Edith to try to fix this narrative! (I would likely have called this novel Edith the Thirteenth.)
Worse: she isn’t just in a fully written book: she is in a hellish afterlife in which the author of the novel can (and will) intervene to make the story turn out the way THEY want. They are determined to kill off Edith, and give the blonde princess the best of everything.
Can Suna/Edith beat the author and survive? Or will the author/deity of this world keep pressing the other characters to hate / blame / attempt to kill Edith, despite her best efforts?
I appreciate that Suna, who was so broke and miserable in her modern life, really APPRECIATES the good things in her new life. Also, unlike countless other stories, she gets to enjoy her hot husband – she isn’t a child, she is having a grown up relationship! What Edith wants for him is better than what the author wants, and he is willing to become a better person to pitch in, as he should. Also: she gets to go to the gay fashion designer for her gowns, and I wish this for all good characters!
I’m rooting for abuse survivor Edith the 13th and her hot husband to defeat the author/deity who is conspiring against them.