An abstract drawing I made depicting an omnipresent being

Mine has changed to Torture Princess from Spider

I love Serial Experiments Lain.

And I'm looking for a light novel that is similar in the heavy psychological themes. End of Evangelion Movie is also close to what I'm looking for.

Preferably it doesn't have like 15 volumes, looking for a rather short one. But that's not so important, as long as it's psychological And covers themes of ego, consciousness etc.

And if so, why or why not?

Is it the setting, the way it is written, the themes, or the illustrations, or a combination of them?

Do you read 'regular' books as well?

I was watching Anime for a long time already, picked up a manga here and there but I didn't really enjoy them. It felt like there was so little story and I could finish one in under an hour. So I gave up on Manga.

I watched So I'm a Spider, So What?/ Kumo desu ga, nani ka? when it started airing and it hooked me instantly. Her character. The world. The comedy. Everything. (Except the humans...).

Once it was over, I wanted more. And since everyone kept saying the Light Novel is way better, especially the human side, I bought the first 3 volumes.

It was amazing. I binge read them until I had to wait for the English releases. Right now I'm waiting for vol. 16 to be available again so I can finish this series.

I was just wondering, since I only read books that I physically possess.

eBooks aren't my thing.

Do you read rips or buy the ebook/book officially?

This doesn't exactly fit but it's close enough.

This was in 2016 or 2017.

A good friend of mine was in need of a new PC and wanted to buy a prebuilt. I gently (maybe not so gently) told him that was a waste of money and I could build a better one for cheaper. So I put together a decent budget oriented mid tier build for him. i5 and a GTX 1060 6gb. All was well at this point. We ordered the parts to his house and I got on a train to his city to put it together.

At this point in time, I wasn't an expert on building PC's. I had built two PCs in total. both very budget oriented.

So we (I) start building the PC. All goes well. Each part at it's place. Each cable connected (supposedly). Press the power button. doesn't POST. reseat everything. doesn't POST . My friend is getting very anxious at this point which is slightly annoying to me... Saying he should have just built a prebuilt. This in turn is making me uneasy. We decided to take it a PC shop so that they can test if a component is dead. And mostly to ease his anxiousness.

We take the whole computer, which is basically 'ready' in a cardboardbox to the pc shop. Taking public transit with a huge and decently heavy box isn't that comfortable. Arriving at the PC shop we explain the problem to the worker. He takes one look at it and goes: 'You haven't connected to 6pin power cable for the CPU'

Cue embarassment. But also relief that it was just a stupid oversight, fitting to my inexperience.

Back in his home, we connect the cable. It posts. all is good. Mainboard has no wifi built in so we get an ethernet cable. No connection. Ethernet doesn't work. I tried everything that I could and it didn't work. He bought a cheap usb wifi adapter. which works. To this day The ethernet doesn't work. He is still using that PC. I'm telling him he should upgrade it, or more like replace it completely.

He want's to buy a prebuilt. I tell him I can build him a pc for better and cheaper. I feel like im experiencing a deja vu. Hope the second round goes smoother..