Sean Gaffney

By Namekojirushi and Nao Watanuki. Released in Japan as “Ore ga Heroine o Tasukesugite Sekai ga Little Mokushiroku!?” by Hobby Japan. Released in North America digitally by J-Novel Club. Translated by Adam Lensenmayer.

To a certain extent, a lot of light novels in Japan have a certain level of knowing irony built into their very frame. You don’t have a genre with that many long-winded over-dramatic series titles and not know that your tongue is planted firmly in your cheek, though by now, a few years out, I suspect many of the imitators may have bypassed the irony in favor of “long titles sell”. But if you do understand, and your audience does as well, there’s a lot you can make fun of. Especially in the so-called “harem” genre, something which has been around in North America since the dawn of manga here (see Ranma 1/2 for only one example) and is even more rife in Japan. Jealous childhood friends, wishy-washy male leads, cripplingly shy yet adorable girls who always enthrall the male audience yet never actually win… we all know the type. It’s ripe for being made fun of.

Our hero is a young man who only wishes to live a normal life. Sadly, Rekka is told by his father on his 16th birthday that he’s inheriting the birthright of being the “final hero” – i.e., when a crisis is happening somewhere and a hero is needed but has not actually materialized, died, or failed, Rekka will be called to action to get the girl, kill the baddies, and save the entire planet. The keywords here being “get the girl”. Shortly after this, a young girl from the future, R, pops up to tell Rekka that he made too many girls fall in love with him doing this, and his inability to settle down and pick one has led to a future apocalypse. R is here to help prevent this. And right after this, the hero stuff keeps pouring in. His childhood friend is secretly a mage, an alien princess wants to marry him, and a shy sorcerer needs hims help to defeat the Demon Overlord. The conceit is that this all happens at the same time.

I must admit, my expectations were somewhat low for this release. The dire but similar “My Little Sister Can Read Kanji” release by J-Novel was so bad I wasn’t even able to finish (or review) it. But it looked lighthearted at least, and I was in the mood for something that wasn’t just dour overpowered male leads staring at the charred remains of all they once loved. And luckily, this ended up being a quite readable treat. It’s not great art, and overstays its welcome (something that is worrying given how long the series is in Japan). But it knows what it’s mocking and does it very well. Some of the jokes actually made me laugh out loud, a rarity for light novels. Its one big drawback is that it peaks too soon. Rekka and Harissa battling the Demon Overlord, complete with “you fools! This isn’t even my final form!” is the absolute highlight of the entire book, and the rest couldn’t dream of topping it.

The basic premise is actually quite clever: Rakka would normally be taking care of these things one by one, and likely not doing a great job. But with them all happening at once, he’s able to use resources from one heroine route to fix another. And they aren’t necessarily easy fixes, either – I knew the moment that he left Harissa right after defeating the Demon Overlord handily that it wouldn’t be that simple, and sure enough she’s soon on the chopping block to be executed. As for Rekka himself, he’s amusingly dense, but he’s not an incompetent clumsy idiot like a lot of harem heroes – you actually get why these girls fall for him. The heroines themselves are all obvious types, designed to win over whichever pleases the reader best, and none are too annoying. Best of all is R, who is invisible to all but Rekka and is thus able to float around him at all times making dry, sarcastic remarks about his incompetence. “I now understand the difficulty of my mission in my heart and not just in my head” was wonderful. (I also hope that she does not become part of the harem in future books.)

Overall, I’m pleasantly surprised at what a light, breezy read this was. Don’t read it if you can’t tolerate harems, of course. And like many light novels, I suspect it’s something I’d find far more aggravating as an anime or manga with more visual fanservice. But if you want something funny and cheeky, this is a good series to get.

By Fujino Omori and Suzuhito Yasuda. Released in Japan as “Dungeon ni Deai o Motomeru no wa Machigatte Iru Darou ka?” by Softbank Creative. Released in North America by Yen On. Translated by Andrew Gaippe.

Writing books can be difficult. In addition to actually making sure that you have a decent plot, characterization, action scenes, etcetera, there’s always so much that can go wrong when your target audience is reading it. Maybe they don’t like a new character you introduced to be loved, or perhaps that scene you thought was really romantic is seen as a bit creepy when talked about by others on the internet. There is also page creep, a little-known malady that affects many long series, in which each successive book seems to get longer and longer, till you suddenly realize that you don’t so much have a book as you have a tome. That’s the case with the latest DanMachi, which is so long that you could fit three Kagerou Daze novels inside it. That said, it doesn’t feel all that padded or overdone. Sadly, it does have two major issues.

But first let’s talk about what did work. The new volume manages to build on the events of the last one while also undercutting it, as for a moment it looks like everyone wants to join the Hestia Family… till they hear about Hestia’s huge debt for the knife she bought for Bell, and all that just vanishes. Bell’s strength is less easy to hide, and things get even more difficult when Ishtar, the goddess in charge of the city’s prostitutes, discovers what Bell’s secret really is – she sees the stats on his back. Ishtar is a good villain, suffering from an obvious case of second best syndrome and overcompensating because of it. She’s second best here as well, as Freya simply wipes the floor with her. In fact, this book is packed with fights and chase scenes, and they’re all done quite well, and are what make the book so long. Mikoto finally gets a chance to shine, and she’s awesome, even if she reminds me a bit too much of Kyuubei from Gintama. And we also meet Haruhime, the newest addition to the cast, with her tragic past, terrible secret, amazing power, and self-hatred that’s more powerful than all of those.

I have two issues with this book, one small, one large. The first is more “I hate this cliche” than anything else: Ishtar’s prostitutes are all tall, strong, gorgeous Amazon warriors… except the strongest of them, who is a frog-faced crone who goes on about her beauty while making everyone around her shudder. Phyrne is a giant pile of “ugly = evil”, and that’s one stereotype I’d love to see end. The other is far more vexing. This novel revolves in many ways about prostitutes and virginity. Bell is, of course, a pure, virgin hero, and this purity is so blinding that he can even resist the charms of a goddess – in fact, it’s part of his basic nature. (This of course only makes them want him all the more.) And Haruhime tells Bell that she’s was bought and forced to work as a prostitute, and is therefore not worth saving. Bell rejects this, saying that even if she *is* a prostitute, she still deserves to be rescued as much as anyone. I liked this. It’s possibly the major theme of the book. So then WHY would you have the reader be told at the last minute “Oh, she was such a bad prostitute that she always fainted, so is still a virgin?” Why would you undercut Bell’s entire point? It is a really, really terrible moment.

But apart from those two things, this is a solid entry in the franchise. I believe that the next volume is short stories, so we may have to wait a bit to see what the fallout from this book is. Worth a pickup, but you may grind your teeth towards the end.

By Reki Kawahara and abec. Released in Japan by ASCII Mediaworks. Released in North America by Yen On. Translated by Stephen Paul.

Here we go, ladies and gentlemen. This is it. This is the Big One. This volume of Sword Art Online begins the Alicization Arc, an arc that will not end until Vol. 18 rolls around in December 2019. And you can tell from the writing in many ways, as Kawahara is taking his time to set things up and carefully introduce things that will clearly have relevance later – not least of which is Alice herself, whose disappearance is one of the major plot points of the book, but it’s not resolved here. For those who love the main heroines of Sword Art Online, well, you may be in for some hard times. Asuna is here at the start, as well as Shino. We even hear about future plans, as Shino discusses the next Bullet of Bullets tournament and Asuna and Kirito make plans for going to college overseas. Unfortunately, life has other plans. Fortunately, we have a new heroine, in the best Sword Art Online tradition, to help Kirito with this crisis. He’s even on the cover. Wait, he?

Yes, that’s right, the author has finally realized that the occasional appearance by Klein isn’t cutting it, and gives Kirito someone who can be an equal as well as (sort of) a childhood friend. The conceit of this book is that Kirito is testing a new VR system that’s the most realistic one yet – unlike Aincrad and the other VMRROs we’ve seen to date, this new system is able to mimic things down to the last detail. It’s also, apparently, able to give you vivid backstory if need be – the first 60 or so pages of this book are Kirito, Eugeo and Alice as kids hanging around their medieval fantasy hometown and getting involved in things that they should not. Unfortunately, after an attack in the real world by an ex-member of Laughing Coffin (really, all of these guys basically got away scot-free, didn’t they?), Kirito now finds himself, grown up, in the same world, though he’s now himself and Eugeo doesn’t seem to know him. Now he has to a) find out where he is, b) find out how to return to Asuna, and c) join forces with Eugeo and rescue Alice, who was taken away years ago by Knights as a punishment for transgressing one of the many Laws..

The viewpoint here is, with the exception of the childhood prologue, 1st person Kirito as usual. I find it more tolerable than others do, I suspect, mostly as I think the best way to remind us that Kirito isn’t superhuman is by showing us his thoughts and fears. I also really like Eugeo, the new guy. He’s sort of bright, shiny and innocent, the kind of really good guy that the girls all think Kirito is but he’s never quite managed to pull off. He’s also surprisingly skilled with a sword, and Kirito wonders if more training might even make the two of them a close match. (I hope so. It’s always refreshing seeing Kirito not be the best at something.) When this book is telling Kirito’s story, it’s excellent. Unfortunately, there is one big weakness – Kawahara is fascinated by his invented technobabble (this is also an issue in his other series), and there is endless discussion of vitual reality and what life and a soul actually means. I’m sure it will be highly relevant later, but having it come out in the form of an infodump made things a bit tedious, which is a shame given it was our one big scene with Asuna and Shino.

In any case, though, overall this was a very good start to a very big arc, introducing a new (missing) heroine, giving Kirito a potential male best friend and partner, allowing Kawahara to try his hand at a “fantasy” setting with knights and goblins (who talk about sexually assaulting a young girl, something that apparently is so common in Japanese light novels with goblins that I’ve now run across it three times in less than a month), and setting things up for the next book. Will we be cutting back to the real world and Asuna at all, though? And will Liz and Silica ever get More Appearances? (The back cover of Book 10 may offer a clue there.) Let’s see if Alicization hits the ground running next time.

By Katsuhisa Kigitsu. Released in Japan by Akita Shoten, serialized in the magazine Champion Red. Released in North America by Seven Seas. Translated by Jocelyne Allen, Adapted by Shanti Whitesides.

More of everything. More outrageous humor, more appalling horror, more of the few sympathetic members of the cast having their lives destroyed in the worst way possible, more of the deeply horrible darkness that is humanity, and so many goddamn Sentinels that you’ll never want to watch sentai shows again. All of this is in the final omnibus of Franken Fran, where the author clearly knows things are wrapping up, and has therefore decided to make this Franken Fran’s Greatest hits. Which is fine, as that’s exactly what we read Franken Fran for. It’s over the top, it goes to far, it’s offensive but hilarious. And in the end you aren’t even sure if Fran is alive or dead.

Of course, sometimes things are moving a bit too fast. The author has a lot of stories to tell, and a limited number of pages in which to do so (he said in one afterword that he was forced to make one into a two-parter). The first story in the volume ends SO abruptly that I actually had to check to verify that we weren’t missing pages (and also gives us a bad end to another likable woman whose only crime is hanging around Fran too much, though like most of this ensemble cast she shows up right as rain again later). The art also seems a little messier than usual, as if it’s simply being drawn to too tight of a deadline. And sometimes the stories don’t really land – I admit that I’m sort of sick of the Sentinels, and didn’t need to see this much of their antics again.

The one story in here that stands out above all others – indeed, I suspect it to be the main reason fans clamored for this to be licensed in the first place – has Gavril hired to come to Fran and Veronica’s school and be a substitute teacher. We’ve seen teachers before who don’t act the part and dispense “real life” advice rather than platitudes, but Gavril takes this beyond eleven, telling guys the proper way to threaten rape on their fellow classmates, giving girls advice on how to get ahead in this world, and basically being the worst Great Teacher ever. Naturally, the kids all love her, mostly as, given that they’re in Franken Fran, the entire school is sort of deeply twisted to begin with. Other excellent chapters involve horror (Fran’s octopus specimen gets stolen, with amazingly dreadful results), humor (the continuing awfulness of every moment of Kuho’s life as a policewoman), or simply tragedy (the other best story in this volume, in which Veronica’s new friend at school takes agency against the adults who are gang-raping her in a particularly vengeful way).

The volume caps off with a dream sequence, after Fran is trapped on an ocean liner that sinks to the bottom of the sea. She dreams of the entire cast coming out to thank her for everything she’s done to them – sorry, I mean for them – over the years. Okita is in a human body, Kuho (and her clones) are happy, hell, even Veronica is briefly happy (so you can tell it’s a dream). And, like the first story in the volume, the ending is sort of ambiguous. Did Fran actually wake up and get rescued? Or is she just dreaming she’s back at the operating table? Franken Fran was a grand horror/comedy mess, and while I think it may have offended more people than it impressed, I always admired its moxie. I’ll miss it.

By Tsutomu Sato and Kana Ishida. Released in Japan as “Mahouka Koukou no Rettousei” by ASCII Mediaworks. Released in North America by Yen On. Translated by Andrew Prowse.

I had mentioned in my Manga the Week of post that I was very amused at the coincidence that this third volume released only one month after the 9th volume of A Certain Magical Index, which is *also* the first of a two-book arc featuring a sports competition between various schools disrupted by a terrorist attack. (As it happens, they even have the same translator, who must have wondered what god he offended to get these assignments right in a row.) That said, thankfully the books take slightly different tacks. Index is fully concerned with the terrorist attack, and the competition games take something of a back seat. This first volume of Mahouka’s new arc is almost all about the games themselves, with the terrorist attacks only starting to come up near the end. And while Touma may be Index’s star, he rarely completely overpowers the storylines. The same can’t be said for Tatsuya, who is, as ever, the most awesome man to ever awesome.

I say this with affection, of course. I enjoy this series, and frankly if you’re still reading this series and don’t enjoy what they’re doing with Tatsuya after the first two volumes, what the heck is wrong with you? It’s actually helped by how ridiculous it gets – you can’t help but laugh at his discomfort as Azusa gushes about her love of the mysterious student engineer Taurus Silver, and Tatsuya does everything but rub the back of his head and laugh uncomfortably. Not that he would ever do that, as we do get a bit more backstory as to exactly what’s wrong with his basic personality. It’s apparently by family design, and he literally can’t feel emotional extremes. Which is handy if you want to keep your lead male from the standard harem series ‘whoops I walked in on the girls changing’ stuff, but can be a bit off-putting as well, because it’s hard to get a read on Tatsuya even when we are getting his inner thoughts.

We get a new member of his inner circle this volume as well. Mikihiko is a magician whose abilities are sort of being suppressed by a magic accident right now, and so he’s lumped in Course 2 with the rest of the “bad magic students”. Of course, like every other Course 2 student in Tatsuya’s inner circle, Mikihiko actually has brilliant magical control of spirits and will no doubt shine when the story call for it; his issue seems to be more self-doubt and angst. It’s not just him, either; many of the upperclassmen competing in the games feel a bit underpowered compared to our amazing lead, and those feelings don’t just go away. (The women, of course, have no such issues, and clean up in every event – or would, if not given a game-breaking injury by said terrorists.) Magic School is tough, and everyone is having difficulties working under the pressure.

This being the first of a two-book arc (though like the last arc, it seems to stop rather than come to a cliffhanger – did the author write one huge book that had to be cut in half AGAIN?), there’s lots of plot threads introduced that I’m sure will pay off in the second book, including Chinese mafia and a student from a rival school who seems to have fallen for Tatsuya’s sister Miyuki at first sight (boy, is he in for crushing disappointment) .So in the end, there are only two big flaws to this otherwise highly entertaining series. The first is the magical discussion, which goes on and on as if it’s trying to be a textbook as much as a novel. And the second is Tatsuya, who the reader needs to accept really is just that awesome, or they will hate this. I’ve accepted it. Viva Tatsuya!

By Jun Mochizuki. Released in Japan as “Vanitas no Shuki” by Square Enix, serialization ongoing in the magazine Gangan Joker. Released in North America by Yen Press. Translated by Taylor Engel.

Steampunk as a genre is usually a sign that fun is about to ensue, and it’s no different in Japanese manga. From Soul Eater to Sakura Taisen, the idea of Victorian fashion and technological advances has always intrigued the promising new creator. And here we have The Case Study of Vanitas, a new series from the creator of Pandora Hearts. (A very new series, in fact – We’re already caught up with Japan, so don’t expect this one to be every other month.) And the story begins with a giant dirigible, looking as ridiculous as you could possibly imagine. Yet all of this is perhaps distracting myself from the simple fact that at its core, The Case Study of Vanitas is a series about various types of vampires and how to deal with them. Yup. More vampires.

My weariness of the glut of licensed vampire titles is well known, but I will quash it when it’s in the service of a good title. And, for the most part, The Case Study of Vanitas is a good title. It’s light and frothy, despite the presence of dark creatures of the night and the occasional horrific death. There’s lots of action scenes in midair, and confrontations on well-lit backroads. Our hero really isn’t the guy on the cover but Noe, a vampire who has come to Paris searching for the mysterious Book of Vanitas, which is said to be able to interfere with the true name of a vampire. Imagine our surprise when he finds the owner of the book after only about 30 pages. This *is* the guy on the cover, who calls himself Vanitas and is seemingly going around trying to be a “doctor” for vampires by using the book.

To be honest, there is one big weakness with the first volume, and that’s Vanitas himself. Normally I’m quite find of the obnoxious guy who rubs everyone the wrong way, but this time he was starting to rub me the wrong way too. Vanitas is simply too unlikable for a series that’s designed to revolve around him. I suspect the author knows this – that’s why Noe fulfills the hero role a bit better – but something just sours me, especially when he forces himself on the Witch Jeanne who’s come to wipe them out at the behest of her young master. I just suspect that I’m supposed to find him funny and amusing in a horrible way, but the horrible is what sticks.

That said, other than its title character, this was a great deal of fun. Lots of vampire lore and blood for those who do love the genre, a few officious bureaucrats and stoic servants, and in the middle of it is Noe, who spends much of the volume staring at Vanitas with a “the fuck?” look on his face. There’s hints of a tragic past with him, which I suspect we’ll get in the second volume. In the meantime, steampunk vampires!

By Satoshi Wagahara and 029. Released in Japan by ASCII Mediaworks. Released in North America by Yen Press. Translated by Kevin Gifford.

The Devil Is a Part-Timer! is one of the few light-novel series currently being released in North America that has not had a multi-volume arc of some kind. By the end of each volume, things are somehow resolved enough that everyone can go back to the apartment complex. And yet each successive volume builds on the last, layering on more backstory revelations, character dilemmas, and (for this particular series) religious imagery until we realize that really, it’s been one big arc all along. Which is just what you want for a series like this. Each new volume makes you want to read the next one immediately. This one in particular, as Maou finally starts to give some answers as to what he was doing back in Enta Isla. Not many, but a few.

Of course, part of the reason that Maou is able to reveal to readers that yes, he was actually trying to conquer the world through war (something he regrets now) is because we now know that he did not in fact horribly murder Emi’s father. She’s still trying to deal with everything she found out in the last book, particularly the identity and status of her mother, and it’s left her a mixture of angry and devastated. Most of these books have been Emi discovering that literally everything she lived her entire life for has been a giant lie, and that a lot of people see her as a giant tool to point and shoot. We’re still nowhere near them being friends, but Emi is finally starting to get to the point where she’s not screaming at Maou every time she sees him, and can work with him against a common enemy, which is happening more and more frequently these days.

And then there’s Chiho’s development, as it turns out that when you fill a girl with divine mystical energies and use her body as a conduit, it can actually have lasting effects. Luckily, this is a still a relatively light-hearted series, and Chiho is so big-hearted, that it mostly means teaching her ways to psychically communicate with the others in case she’s ever kidnapped again – which turns out to be of great use when she is, in fact, kidnapped again. I like the fact that Chiho turns out to be surprisingly adept at magic, to the point where even Suzuno is startled at how fast she’s picking things up, and what she’s doing with it. I also really liked that psychic thought projection is likened to cell phone usage to make things easier to understand, and that imagery may be one reason she’s so good at it.

I’d mentioned in my last review that I loved the pointless daily life segments more than anything else, and while there aren’t as many of them this time, we do get some lovely discussion of how to be a barista. The McRonald’s has now become a McCafe, which means Maou and Chiho will now be serving coffee. This also serves to give us some much-longed for depth in regards to their manager Mayumi, and her discussion of her life’s dream (to be a bartender) leads neatly to Maou discussing his own goals and dreams. Much to his frustration, everyone seems to assume that he’s hiding out in Japan to give up. No, he’s hiding out in Japan to learn how to take over the world… ECONOMICALLY! Because that’s a much less blood-filled way of conquering than the old one. It was nice seeing Maou’s drive to rule the world pop up again, and I suspect the cast will be back in Enta Isla before long – though I assume not permanently.

This series continues to be top-tier. Great plot, the backstory hangs together, the characterization flows smoothly, and the narration can sometimes be quite witty even though it’s third person. I would say I can’t wait till the next volume, but Vol. 7 appears to be a short-story collection, so I’ll likely have to wait till Vol. 8. That’s OK. Like Maou, I’m patient.

By Kafka Asagiri and Sango Harukawa. Released in Japan by Kadokawa Shoten, serialization ongoing in the magazine Young Ace. Released in North America by Yen Press. Translated by Kevin Gifford.

I often regret that I haven’t read as much classical Japanese literature as I should. To be fair, a great deal of it is not translated into English, but there’s a ton that is as well, and for all that I’ve wanted to read No Longer Human, it sits on my phone with about 80 million other books I tried to read and then got distracted by. But I suppose I’m going in with the wrong mindset, as I don’t really want to read these works for their literary value, but in order to understand what the hell is going on in all the manga that make references to them. And honestly, do I know any other Dazai than No Longer Human? Did I even know the classic film Rashomon was based on a short story? And if I knew the literary references that flit throughout the first volume of Bungo Stray Dogs, would I find it more interesting than I did?

Without the literary references, what we have here is a somewhat standard superhero team-up story. Our young hero is an abandoned orphan fleeing a monstrous tiger creature that’s been following him around and wreaking havoc; he sees a very eccentric young man supposedly trying to kill himself in the nearby river and rescues him, and their two lives become intertwined. It turns out that a) the supposedly suicidal young man (like Zetsubou-sensei, it’s played for laughs throughout) is part of a group with powers who form a detective agency, and b) our hero IS the tiger that follows him around – that’s his power, though he’s been sort of suppressing it. After a brief test to see if he has the skill and compassion to make it in their agency, he joins up with them and they battle a mafia kingpin who uses his powers not for niceness, but for evil.

The literary references come in because they’re all named after famous Japanese authors and poets, and their powers are based on their most famous work. Dazai is the eccentric man, and his power is No Longer Human. The villain, Akutagawa, has a power called Rashomon, from the short story of the same name. And so forth. Without this, unfortunately, you’re mostly left with something that we’ve seen a lot of before, and I’m not sure the gimmick is enough to keep me interested. It doesn’t help that we get brother/sister incest used for humor value, something that can be done with a light touch, but rarely is a light touch used. There’s no doubt this is popular – it spawned an anime, and the cast are attractive bishies who snark at each other much of the time. The action scenes are also pretty well done. But I’m not sure that’s enough to make me come back. It’s good, but lacks that certain something.

By Reki Kawahara and Hima. Released in Japan by ASCII Mediaworks. Released in North America by Yen On. Translated by Jocelyne Allen.

Much as I said last review that this one was probably going to be nothing more than a string of fights, that doesn’t appear to be the case. Bar the beginning, where despite everything Haru and Chiyuri do indeed succeed in punching hope into Takumu, this volume is a bit of breathing room in the midst of what has become a 4-volume arc. What this volume actually ends up being is a giant pile of good times for Haru, as if the author knew that too much bad stuff had rained down on him lately and so is trying to make up for it here. We get the renewed bonds of friendship, some cute ship tease, and finally succeed in busting out of the Accel World version of the Imperial Palace. We even get to see Haru bust some moves in a basketball game. No, really.

And look, another cover image that isn’t Kuroyukihime posing half-naked! (Don’t worry, it’ll be back for the 9th volume.) But yes, part of the plot of this book is to show how to move to the next level with the Incarnate system, and apparently it involved confronting what your worst trait is, and turning it into a positive. No prizes for guessing that Haru’s self-hatred and urge to escape his troubles is his big negative – this is what led to Silver Crow in the first place. But now we start to see him consciously apply what everyone else has always known are his good points – his ability to analyze a situation and come up with an appropriate response, combined with nearly infinite compassion. Let me tell you something, I realize that OT3s don’t actually happen in actual anime/manga, and also that the endgame of this series is clearly (and deservedly) Kuroyukihime. But after reading the first third of this book, you too will believe in the Childhood Friends Threesome of Pure Love.

Then there’s that basketball game. It’s not as if Haru magically becomes a good athlete, or even an average one – he literally works himself into unconsciousness. But this is the first time that we’ve really seen Haru take what he’s learned from fighting battles in the Accelerated World and apply it to real life – not in a cheating sense, but in terms of using his brain to analyze the best course of action. It’s telling that the one actual basketball player on the other team gives him respect – he’s earned it, simply by not giving up immediately and coming up with a solid plan. (They do still lose, I mean this isn’t Sword Art Online.)

Naturally, of course, it all crashes and burns in the end. After escaping from the Castle, we find that the ISS-infected users are busy torturing Ash Roller and his child – and likely doing so until they’re both forced from the game forever. Haru’s compassion is a big positive, but when he sees his friends cruelly tortured, it comes out in the worst possible way – revenge. And so the Chrome Disaster is back, and we have yet another volume to try to resolve this. Kawahara says it’s the last one, he promises. He’s said that before, of course. But I don’t mind. It’s a great arc in an underrated series.

By Yui Hara. Released in Japan by Houbunsha, serialization ongoing in the magazine Manga Time Kirara Max. Released in North America by Yen Press. Translated by Amanda Haley.

For the most part, when we’ve seen ‘girls in a high school hang out and do things together’ titles in North America, they’ve tended to be attached to some sort of club or activity. K-On! had its band, Sunshine Sketch and GA Art Design Class both revolved around its specialized art classes, etc. To an extent, Kiniro Mosaic does that as well – this time the theme is “foreign exchange students”. We get one right at the start, and midway through another one pops up – both from England. Thus the theme of this series is supposed to be ‘see the amusing ways that Japanese and British culture can clash’. Of course, like many of these sorts of series, including both K-On! and Sunshine Sketch, the real question involved is “how much yuri tease are we going to get?”. So far, a goodly amount.

Our first exchange student is Alice, who’s actually pretty well-versed in Japanese, and mostly runs into issues with cultural variations and such. She’s staying with Shinobu, who stayed with her in England a year or two earlier. Shinobu is the standard ‘average Japanese girl’ for the most part, a bit dense, but she does have one defining character trait, which is her love of cute things, especially blonde girls. Naturally, she really loves Alice, sometimes a little too much. Adding to this we have the remaining three girls; Youko, who is active and somewhat oblivious; Aya, who is usually the straight man of the group, and seems to have a crush on Youko; and Karen, another exchange student who’s not nearly as good at Japanese as Alice is, and thus speaks somewhat brokenly; she seems to be the ‘baka’ of the group, though as always with these types of series I suspect that ball will be passed around as the plot warrants.

There’s nothing inherently wrong with this book – everyone’s likeable, cute, and amusing. I suspect it may be funnier for a Japanese speaker, who is more readily able to see the cultural differences a little better than I can. That said, there’s nothing yet that really draws me in like the series I mentioned above do. I suppose there’s the potential yuri tease, but unlike, say, Bloom Into You or similar series, I don’t think I expect too much from that front – after all, nothing canonically happened in K-On!, Sunshine Sketch or GA either (though Sunshine Sketch came reaaaaaal close). So it’s definitely worth a read if you enjoy seeing cute girls crushing on other cute girls. But if that’s not your thing, I suspect this really isn’t going to do much for you. It’s light as air. And of course, being the genre that it is, I don’t expect many dramatic moments to advance the plot – there’s only cute, and there is no plot. Even if someone has to move back to England, you get the feeling it will be resolved by the end of the chapter. Mildly recommended to fans of this genre.