Why so much disparity between novel, manga, and anime.

madorkakaname said:
my apologies, but this is a ridiculous and gross misreading of the novel; this perspective can only be assumed by someone approaching the novel with hopes of explicit gay romance taking the forefront. of course, this novel series isn't about gay romance. it's about imperialism and capitalism, it's written by a member of the japanese communist party, after all. 

the reader is supposed to be shion, someone living in the imperial core, ignorant to the atrocities committed by their nation to maintain hegemony. he is radicalized by experiencing an event that triggers his empathy for his fellow man, marginalization via being forced out of a privileged class (still in the imperial core), and then witnessing an event that removes any doubt of "foul play" by intelligence agencies representing the imperial nation. we are shion as members of the imperial core (presumably japanese, and then euroamericans), we are moving through a story that radicalizes us to revolt against a state that systematically disenfranchises those in the peripheries and killed off the native people to occupy their land (nezumi is one of these natives). this isn't even me reading into this, it's literally in the english-translated afterward by the author. in volume two she writes:

"As you are reading this particular page of the story right now, what sort of scene is unfolding around you? What is happening with the wars, with starvation, with the world? Is the killing still
continuing? Is hatred still overflowing? Is despair still brimming?... Yes: I feel like I've lived thus far without knowing anything, nor trying to know. I suffer no ailments; I never need to worry about food for tomorrow; I live life without having to feel a smidgeon of fear from being blasted by landmines or rocket bombs. I love my somewhat boring, but peaceful life. And that's fine in itself. But when I peeled back a bit of that peaceful life, I couldn't go without seeing that it was actually very closely connected with foreign lands that seemed so distant; with the war and starvation that people were suffering in those lands. Individuals are always connected to their nation, and the nation is always connected to the rest of the world. It is impossible to cut them apart. And I have finally realized that."

it was daring of her to portray a gay male romance––it wasn't pandering and it wasn't published in the jōsei or bl genre; it was published in young adult entertainment. the manga however was published in a young women's magazine, but none of the other manga in the magazine were bl. it's not baiting anyone and it's just a disrespectful read to a daring woman living in a country where communist thought is suppressed, attempting to write a subversive novel critical of her nation's system.