Mushikaburi-hime

For generations, the Bernstein family has been recognized as a house of nobles who favor books over everything else. Elianna Bernstein, daughter of a baron of the Sauslind Kingdom, is no different. But instead of being called a bookworm, she is known as the Bibliophile Princess.

Four years ago, the crown prince, Christopher Selkirk Asherald, offered Elianna a special arrangement: if she would become his fiancée, he promised that she could continue to spend all her free time reading. Despite having to inherit a title of great responsibility, she agreed to the proposal, enticed by the prospect of gaining access to the royal archives housing a wide selection of books.

To this day, Elianna firmly believes that her engagement is void of romantic sentiment. When she notices Christopher's interactions with another girl, she presumes that the days she spends with him will soon reach an end. Yet, during this period of uncertainty, Elianna and Christopher open a new chapter in their relationship, gradually uncovering their genuine feelings as they grow to better understand each other.

[Written by MAL Rewrite]

Bernstein, Elianna Main

Ueda, Reina Japanese

Asherald, Christopher Selkirk Main

Kimura, Ryouhei Japanese

Ferrera, Alan Supporting

Satou, Gen Japanese

Bernstein, Alfred Supporting

Shimazaki, Nobunaga Japanese

Rei Supporting

Maeno, Tomoaki Japanese

Olanza, Irvin Supporting

Azakami, Youhei Japanese

Agnes Supporting

Neya, Michiko Japanese

Eisenach, Glenn Supporting

Uchida, Yuuma Japanese

Hayden, Anna Supporting

Komatsu, Mikako Japanese

Lady Dauner Supporting

Sugawa, Aki Japanese

Nemoto, Yuuka Producer

Nishimae, Ayaka Producer

Maruyama, Hajime Producer

Yoshida, Yuuki Producer

Reviews

May 3, 2026

ebhaam

Recommended

mushikaburi-hime is slow-paced royal romantic drama anime like Kin No Kuni, Mizu no kuni with few aspect similar to Ascendence Of a Bookworm.

Story:
story is simple, slow burn and beautiful like a poem, but it's not a common & Mainstream romantic anime, it focus on politics and business beside love story.

Direction:
I'm not really fan of direction of this anime, Taro Iwasaki is a freelancer animator/director, i prefer that MADHOUSE's own staff direct this anime: like Kotono Watanabe or Atsuko Ishizuka.

Art Direction & Color design:
the color designer also worked on frieren, i liked her/his Perspectives on landscape,nature and especially flowers.
...
MC characters:
Eliana is little bit nerd and sometimes it bother me, but not a bad character that everyone thought, it's normal that Bookworms are introvert and not acceptable for all people.

Reviewer’s Rating: 8

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Sep 15, 2025

OneeSama

Mixed Feelings

It's ok.

Has some nice and cute scenes, but the heroine keeps falling for the same troubles over and over again which gets reptitive.
It's your run of the mill royalty romance where the heroine gets bullied by other jealous girls.
She is voiced by the same VA as Miyu from My Happy Marriage using the same intonation. I'm honestly getting tired of the soft innocent about to cry sound. This isn't to say Ueda Reina is a bad VA, she's worked on several characters I like, but this specific style she does is tiresome.

Not a great anime, but not too horrible, an ok show to pass time.

Reviewer’s Rating: 6

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Oct 31, 2025

AeroGunz

Not Recommended

“Bibliophile Princess” is what happens when an incompetent writer creates something so bad it should be saved for prosperity as a warning.

I am a victim of my own expectations and a trusting nature. After reading the synopsis I was actually hyped. A girl in love with books caught in the middle of some political shenanigans? Sign me the eff up. The level of pain I experienced with each episode was immeasurable and my day was ruined. I was expecting something closer to “Ascendance of a Bookworm”. Something with an active, intelligent protagonist that has a goal, strives for it and learns some lessons that can’t ... be learned by reading. You know, the simple but sweet story with maybe a little bit convoluted plot for added measure.
Oh boy… was I wrong.

Before we start I would like to explain something. I will be talking about “plot” and “story”. Many people use those terms interchangeably. I’m not one of those people, so to make sure everyone is on the same page…
I use the definitions for “plot” and “story” as Lisa Cron describes them:
“What happens in the story is the PLOT, the surface events.”
“STORY is about how the things that happen affect someone in pursuit of a difficult goal, and how that person changes internally as a result”.

The story actually had potential. A story about a girl that was plucked from her element, that misunderstood her circumstances, got a reality check and now has to adapt to her new reality. I like that. That is a good story. At least it would be if the writer wasn’t a complete moron. There are 12 episodes in this show and not 1 is written in any way, shape or form I would call competent. In every one Elianna (the MC) is a victim of her own lack of backbone and someone has to come and save her (sometimes figuratively, sometimes literally). Due to the fact that she does look like someone who would creak in a stronger wind I’m all for saving her where there is physical violence in play, but why save her when it’s a verbal confrontation? She has more than enough knowledge to deal with most, if not all, of those kinds of conflicts. But no. For all 12 episodes she’s timid, acts like she’s afraid to breathe and stands like an idiot until someone saves her. For effs sake. Do women like to be saved from even the most mundane problems?

Elianna is one of the most annoying, idiotic, nonsensical and pathetic protagonists I have ever seen in any medium (there are hentai with better female leads). She has no goal, no ambition and no personality. Are we sure this is targeted for adult women? I have a problem believing any woman would find her endearing as their gateway to the story. The most insulting thing for her is that she’s not even the protagonist most of the time. She’s a deuteragonist in her own show. The eff? She doesn’t propel almost anything forward, she does stupid shit and someone else deals with it. Kinda like my ex but that’s beside the point. Ok, one might make an argument, a pretty bad one but an argument nonetheless, that her doing stupid things, jumping into convolutions that make little to no sense is propelling the story forward. No. It does not. The only thing it does propel is the plot and in the most annoying way possible. A lot of the time there is no reason for her acting the way she does and a good 90% of the drama between her and Christopher (oh, I’ll get to this prick soon) could be avoided if at least one of them didn’t have the communication skills of a damn amoeba. It’s not even a problem with him, she has the same communication skills with everyone. The only moments when she shows some backbone are those when someone mistreats a book. Seriously. She gets more worked up because of a book than the fact that someone wants to get rid of her. Ehh...
I really don’t get it. Her backstory is solid enough (still bad), even if boring and lazy (personally I have cliches but I do acknowledge that when done right, they can be good, this is not one of those cases), enough to make her a rather competent protagonist. She has knowledge she could actively use for various tasks and yet we only see her use it two times and both at the tail end of the show. The worst part? There is an episode in the beginning where people are saying how she helped them or the nation. Ok. Let me see that. I want to see that. I want her to be active and I want to see that she’s intelligent, not told that. Show me her knowledge, don’t give me scraps of it in some half baked conversations. I want to see her doing the things people are saying. A lot of those could be actually interesting if written properly (yeah… it wouldn’t have happened with this writer) She’s a good idea for a protagonist but is absolutely butchered as a character and wasted on a show like this.
Episode 6 got my hopes up. Well, to be exact the ending of it got my hopes up. There was a set up for some amazing ideological conflict. Elianna is confronted by someone older and with more experience about her idealism. He actually makes solid points about her idealism and her flaws. I liked that. That was a good set up. I was hoping that finally I would see the MC step down from being just a deuteragonist and step up as a true protagonist. Damn… now I feel stupid. Of course nothing like that happens. To do that we would have to have a writer that has a solid grasp of at least politics and logic and I knew since episode 2 that this one ain't it. Instead what we get is a pointless, naive monologue that, if You stop and think about it, means close to nothing.

Let’s talk a little about the male lead — Christopher — blond hair, blue eyed Hitler’s wet dream (physically only of course) of a character. You know, I am sick of the trope that the crowned prince can do whatever he wants with no consequences. This show suffers from a bad case of sending one of the most important people in the kingdom into danger with little to no back up. For effs sake, there are two moments where he goes into dangerous places and it’s shown he has only 4 people as his guards. Who the fuck approves of that? He has a bodyguard that is not older than he is. What kind of backup is that? It’s almost like the king and queen want him to die. No one in their right mind would allow him to go deal with trivial cases personally and even if, he would have at least a regiment for protection. The fact he does what he wants with little to no guards doesn’t portray him as competent, it doesn’t portray him as cool, it doesn’t portray him as intelligent, it portrays him as incompetent, reckless and stupid. He risks the future of his people for a whim. It’s just so damn annoying.
His behavior towards Elianna isn’t much better. He’s actually the reason she gets into dangerous situations a lot of the time. In two last arcs he is aware of potential danger and yet he says nothing to her. No warning, no sending more than one attendant, not even a damn “have fun and don’t do anything stupid”. Nothing. It’s like he wants her to die. Of course at the end he swoops down and saves her… oh, now I get it. Mofo is doing that on purpose to play the hero. Now it makes sense. It’s not enough for him to have Eliannas love, he also needs her to think of him as the best thing since sliced bread. Narcissistic bastard.
He acts possessively towards Elianna but that is to be expected… for someone in the first stage of a relationship. For fuck’s sake, they know each other 4 years (if not more, the timeline is iffy in this show). You want me to buy into that nothing happened in that time to get their relationship to mature? I get it, those were (and still are) kids but come on. Read at least about Sternberg's triangular love theory before writing about it. I put it like that because it’s pretty obvious the writer was never in love or at least never matured to achieve as Sternberg puts it “Consummate love”, let alone any of the two types of love that come before (FIY there are 8 forms of love in that theory). Instead of talking to her like an adult, maybe make her feel comfortable enough to speak her worries, he is more interested in acting like a lovesick poppy. It’s funny the first time but as it happens more and more it becomes rather revolting.

Now listen. I am not a woman, so I’m not the target audience for this so maybe women out there are into this sort of thing but I hope not. As it stands this show is a waste of time, energy and is an insult to the art of writing itself.

Reviewer’s Rating: 3

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