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The Apothecary Diaries, Vol. 1

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By Natsu Hyuuga and Touko Shino. Released in Japan as “Kusuriya no Hitorigoto” by Hero Bunko. Released in North America by J-Novel Club. Translated by Kevin Steinbach.

I’ve been waiting for this one for a long time (this first novel came out in Japan in 2014), and it would have taken a major misstep for me not to be delighted by it. Spoiler: there was no major misstep. Now admittedly, I can see that it’s not a book for everyone. If your ideal of a fun light novel is along the lines of Sword Art Online or Haruhi Suzumiya, this is not going to be for you. I almost added A certain Magical Index to the list, but I’ll be honest: if you read Index for the political infighting (there must be some who do), this is your sort of book. It will also appeal to fans of Ascendance of a Bookworm, Accomplishments of the Duke’s Daughter and other series heavy on worldbuilding. But most importantly, this will appeal to fans of the classic mystery. Maomao is a reluctant forensic detective, but that is what she is called on to be here, and she excels.

The story opens in the Emperor’s vast royal palace, with our heroine, Maomao, already working there. She was kidnapped while in the woods one day and sold to the palace by “merchants”. For the most part, she does laundry and tries to keep a low profile… till she notices that two of the Emperor’s consorts, and their children, have taken ill with what Maomao (and the reader) can clearly see is mercury poisoning. She tries to subtly convey this, but is discovered by Jinshi, a eunuch who works for the Emperor, and is promoted to be poison tester for the consort whose life she saved. As the book goes on, Maomao finds herself getting involved with more poisonings, assassination attempts, and even standard bullying. The reader, meanwhile, discovers that Maomao is far from the stock shoujo light novel heroine… and even the stoic ones aren’t quite as odd as she is.

As you might guess, Maomao is the number one reason to read this. Her matter-of-fact dialogue and banter with Jinshi is beautiful (the translation shines throughout), and you can see exactly why Jinshi grows so attached to her so fast – she sees through his pretty face for the manipulator he really is, and looks at him “like a worm” – something that I’d say would turn him on if he weren’t a eunuch. (That said, I will not be too surprised if he has a secret to hide about that.) Maomao’s detective work is excellent, both when she’s in her wheelhouse of poisons and also when she’s having to guess motive and opportunity. And, well, she’s weird – curiosity always wins out for her, even when it comes to potentially lethal drugs or foods. I also liked the consorts and the wars between them, from the far too young girl who is passively bullied by her attendants, to the older one with a past to hide, to the sexy one who is on the outs with the Emperor till Maomao gives a very obvious – and hilarious – implied suggestion – as well as Maomao’s own savvy mistress.

The book ends in such a way that it could have been a one-shot, but there are nine volumes to date in Japan, and it has a manga that is being published here by Square Enix. Very much driven by the mysteries and its heroine, I found I was unable to put this book down. Bring on the second volume.

Pick of the Week: Old Favorites and New Choices

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MICHELLE: I have really loved Lovesick Ellie throughout its run, and though I’m sad to see it go, I’m sure I will love the finale, as well. That’s my official pick this week, but honorable mention to Those-Not-So-Sweet Boys. The premise is not the most original in the world, but I’ve loved the other Yoko Nogiri titles Kodansha has published, so I’ll be giving this one a shot, too.

SEAN: I’m reading my Pick of the Week as I speak, and it’s as good as I’d hoped. The Apothecary Diaries has been a long-awaited LN that needed the LN market to be robust to justify a license. It now is, and I hope this sells well, because it is good – especially Maomao, the eccentric and somewhat terrifying heroine.

KATE: I have heard the mermaids singing, each to each, and their message is loud and clear: “Buy volume two of Mermaid Saga, the price is within reach.”

ASH: It’s a week with quite a few interesting new titles being released, but I find that I’m drawn to the re-issue of Mermaid Saga for my pick, too. The series is dark, disconcerting, and utterly fantastic – I’m so glad that it’s finally back in print again.

ANNA: Out of what’s coming out next week, Blue Flag volume 6 is what I’m most likely to read first, so that’s my pick!

As the Villainess, I Reject These Happy-Bad Endings!

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By Iota AIUE and Kuroyuki. Released in Japan as “Watashi, Tensei Akuyaku Reijōnanode, Meribaendo wa Soshi sa Sete Itadakimasu! !” by Berry’s Bunko. Released in North America by Cross Infinite World. Translated by Molly Lee.

By now we are so familiar with the Reincarnated As a Villainess genre that we start to look for differences or alternate takes that make this stand out from the pack. On that score, Happy-Bad Endings (as I’m going to call it) doesn’t hold up so well. This is almost textbook reincarnated villainess, down to the letter. Actually, it’s a good sign that, as I was reading along, I found myself thinking “I want to read the original VN the heroine was playing, it sounds ludicrously over the top. Iris as a heroine is not cheerful yet dim like Katarina, but she does possess a bit of the same “I cannot see this person as anything other than their character from the game”, which certainly frustrates her love interest, the prince. That said, I found this a very good book to read, mostly as it does the genre very well, and it has some individual scenes that are stellar set-pieces.

One morning, Iris du Chevalier wakes up from a horrible nightmare of the world burning to discover… she’s not in Japan playing her favorite otome, game, she’s in the game. And Iris is the villainess. And the game is notorious for even its happy endings being dark and twisted. Her twin brother chains up the love interest and brands her, the prince imprisons her in a tower forever, and the mage discovers that they’re really half-siblings and destroys the world. And, in ALL the endings, good or bad, Iris suffers. Death is not actually the worst thing. Now she has to a) make the three love interests less twisted, b) deal with the soilpox scars on her arm that cause her to be shunned, c) deal with going to the academy despite having literally zero magic, and d) avoid horrible fates. It’s harder than you think!

As I said, the plot itself is pretty much otome villainess 101, but it’s handled well. Iris searching for a way to beat soilpox (this world’s smallpox) is a compelling plot that has nothing to do with the game’s events. The world itself has several elements that weren’t present in the game at all, and finding out about them both gives Iris a huge leg up and also confuses the hell out of her. The heroine, Camille, is sweet as pie but also invites trouble – as you’d expect of an otome heroine. My favorite scene is near the end, where the cast approaches what, to Iris, is the final fate of the most dreaded of her bad ends. She’s long since made sure that this end is not going to happen, but it doesn’t matter – the fact that she is Iris, in the game world, and at THIS place causes her to have a tremendous stress reaction. It’s fantastically written.

So yes, once again, cliches can be defeated when the writing is good enough, which this certainly is. It’s also done-in-one, so you don’t need to worry about a cost sink. A must for Villainess fans, and a good read for shoujo light novel fans.

Also, please don’t name your otome game love interest de Sade. I beg of you.

Yona of the Dawn, Vol. 27

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By Mizuho Kusanagi. Released in Japan as “Akatsuki no Yona” by Hakusensha, serialization ongoing in the magazine Hana to Yume. Released in North America by Viz Media. Translated by JN Productions, Adapted by Ysabet Reinhardt MacFarlane.

While the manga occasionally dips its toes into romance, that’s not its main function. As such, it feels quite refreshing when the end of the last volume and the start of this one focus so much on the feelings that Hak has had for Yona for so long, and finally telling her in one big burst of repression boiling over. This volume focuses on the aftermath, and does a very good job of both being lighthearted and funny about it but also taking his confession and Yona’s response to it seriously. I was worried there would be a “forgot about what happened last night” plot, but nope, Hak knows exactly what he said.As for Yona, while she’s a bit poleaxed there’s no reciprocation here, at least not consciously – she’s still more concerned with doing what they do. Which is good, but it also appears that the days of the Happy Hungry Bunch are being replaced with something a bit more legendary.

We’ve spent the last few volumes seeing the Four Dragons grievously wounded and depowered, and even for the first part of this book they’re still recovering. And while that was a good and important story to tell, it’s a joy and a relief to see everyone getting back to kicking eight kinds of ass. There’s also more humor here, as Hak is trying to alter the legend to add a 5th dragon, though no one’s going along with it. More to the point, though, they’re making themselves known now to world leaders rather than just disgraced princes and poor villages, and the disguise is not working – everyone knows who Yona is. She says, and rightly so, that Su Won knows they’re alive and hasn’t done anything, but they weren’t the chosen ones then.

They’re also not children anymore. Probably my favorite scenes of the book are the conversations between Riri, who is hanging around at the palace mostly as she functions well as Su Won’s beard (something she questions him pointedly on, and he admits a lot of people do think he’s gay). In fact, she’s getting a bit TOO casual with him, as one somewhat chilling scene shows. But there’s a wonderful moment when he goes to look at a mausoleum that he had been forbidden from entering when he was a child. He’d built up this huge idea of it in his head, and is incredibly disappointed to find that it’s just a room. The cast growing up has been one of the most important parts of Yona, and that applies just as much to Su Won as it does to Yona and Hak. Childhood illusions can be powerful, but should not replace the underwhelming reality of life.

Fans of the series don’t have to wait for the next book – my reviews are running behind. But as always, everyone should be reading Yona of the Dawn, and this is a particularly good volume.

My Youth Romantic Comedy Is Wrong As I Expected, Vol. 10.5

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By Wataru Watari and Ponkan 8. Released in Japan as “Yahari Ore no Seishun Rabukome wa Machigatte Iru” by Gagaga Bunko. Released in North America by Yen On. Translated by Jennifer Ward.

As with the previous .5 volume in this series, this is not really a short story volume, as all three stories are interconnected and build on each other like a normal book. If I was to guess why this got a .5, I’d say it’s probably because it does not really advance any of the major plot beats, romantic or otherwise. If you skipped this and went straight to the 11th book, you would be perfectly content… unless you’re an Iroha fan. She’s all over this book, and the costar of the second story, having essentially become a member of the Service Club without ever actually doing anything or officially joining. She just sits in the room all the time. Still, the point of Iroha is that she’s a different type than both Yukino and Yui, and in this volume, despite her supposed ongoing desire for Hayama, we see that she could be a potential third love interest for Hachiman. One that will not win, of course, but hey.

The first story in the book is the one that has the best argument for being a real unconnected short story. Zaimokuza is once again having a crisis of faith about his abilities, and decides that rather than be an author, he’ll be an editor! This leads to the Service Club researching just how hard that is. Lots of funny, biting the hand humor here. The second story has Iroha going on a date with Hachiman, ostensibly to research what she plans to do with Hayama in the future. The best parts here are those where he treats Iroha pretty much the same as Komachi, which is probably the best idea. Finally, Iroha is trying to use up the rest of the student council budget (so that they don’t get a budget cut the next year) by making a magazine to give out at school… and blackmails Hachiman into providing most of the content.

As with the previous volume, Hachiman is still in a pretty mellow mood here. The romance is also on the back-burner, except when Iroha is trying to manipulate Hachiman or get Yukino and Yui pissed off. The best parts of the book show off the contrast between cynical Hachiman and helpful Hachiman, which means the date with Iroha is the best story in the book. They may not make a good romantic pair, but they make for a good faux brother-sister dynamic. The chapter also had some great laughs, such as Hachiman deciding, on a date with another girl, that they should go to separate movies. The most interesting parts of the book, however, come near the end, as Yukino and Yui quietly, in murmured asides that only Hachiman hears, set up the remaining books in the series. The two of them are nearing a crisis point.

So yes, it’s inessential, but it’s still good. Those who enjoy the series’ razor wit will like the first story, those who enjoy Iroha the second, and those who enjoy the main trio will find the third most appealing. This is the last .5 volume, so from here on it’s onward to the end.

Manga the Week of 2/17/21

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SEAN: Valentine Week is here! Looking for some sweet romance? Or bitter breakups? Manga is here for you.

As are light novels. Airship debuts Ride Your Wave (Kimi to, Nami ni Noretara), based on the anime film from the Eizouken director. It will likely be happy yet also sad.

ASH: I enjoy Masaaki Yuasa’s anime, but haven’t actually watched Ride Your Wave yet. Even so, I’m curious about the novelization.

MJ: I have watched it, and I’m absolutely interested in a novelization!

SEAN: Airship also has the print debut of Trapped in a Dating Sim: The World of Otome Games Is Tough for Mobs.

And they have How a Realist Hero Rebuilt the Kingdom 10, Kuma Kuma Kuma Bear 4 (print) and 5 (digital), Restaurant to Another World 5, and The Saint’s Magic Power Is Omnipotent 2.

Dark Horse has the 2nd Blade of the Immortal Deluxe Edition.

ASH: I was surprised to find the Blade of the Immortal deluxe edition was ever so slightly smaller than the Berserk deluxe edition, but they are still impressive tomes.

SEAN: J-Novel Club has two digital debuts. The first we’ve seen the manga of already: The Apothecary Diaries (Kusuriya no Hitorigoto), the story of a young woman sold to the Emperor’s Palace, and full of politics and intrigue.

ASH: I’m glad to see The Apothecary Diaries being translated.

SEAN: The other is The Magician Who Rose from Failure (Shikkaku Kara Hajimeru Nariagari Madō Shidō! ~ Jumon Kaihatsu Tokidoki Senki ~), which features a seeming failure who turns out to be brilliant after remembering his former life. The premise made me sigh, but I enjoyed this author’s The Magic in This Other World Is Too Far Behind!!, so will give this a shot.

Also from J-Novel Club: Full Metal Panic! 10 and I’ll Never Set Foot in That House Again! 2.

Kodansha has two print debuts, one of which we’ve seen digitally. Star⇄Crossed!! (Oshi ga Watashi de Watashi ga Oshi de) is the new series from the Kiss Him, Not Me creator, and is a soul-swapping comedy. It runs in Betsufure.

MICHELLE: I am finally gonna check this out.

ASH: Same!

MJ: Sounds interesting!

ANNA: Me too!

SEAN: The other debut is Those Not-So-Sweet Boys (Amakunai Karera no Nichijo wa), the latest Yoko Nogiri series. A hardworking young girl has to reform a group of seeming bad boys. This runs in Dessert.

MICHELLE: I really like Yoko Nogiri’s style, and will probably like this one, too.

ANNA: I am intrigued.

SEAN: Also in print: Cardcaptor Sakura Collector’s Edition 7, Chobits 20th Anniversary Edition 3, and Sayonara Football 3 (which is a rebranded version of Farewell, My Dear Cramer 1 – The title will be Sayonara Football going forward).

MICHELLE: Meanwhile, they’re still calling the digital version Farewell, My Dear Cramer? That’s nice and confusing.

ASH: I was wondering what was going on with that.

SEAN: Digitally the debut is A Girl & Her Guard Dog (Ojou to Banken-kun), the story of a yakuza daughter trying to have a normal school life… and her guardian, who is not about to let her fall in love. This runs in Betsufure.

MICHELLE: This potentially could be fun.

ANNA: A lot of this sounds great, but given the stacks of unread manga in my house will I actually get around to reading digital shoujo? Probably not.

SEAN: Also digital: The 11th and final volume of Dolly Kill Kill, Fairy Tail: Happy’s Heroic Adventure 8 (also a final volume), GE: Good Ending 14, I Guess I Became the Mother of the Great Demon King’s 10 Children in Another World 3, Lovesick Ellie 12 (also a final volume), Shojo FIGHT! 15, We’re New at This 3, and Will It Be the World or Her? 2.

MICHELLE: I have really enjoyed Lovesick Ellie and though I’m sad to see it end, better now than before it drags on too long.

SEAN: One Peace gives us My Pointless Struggle (Waruagaki), a done-in-one title which is… biography? Sports? I’m not really sure, but it looks manly.

ASH: That it does!

SEAN: From Seven Seas, we get Cube Arts 3 (the final volume), Dragon Goes House-Hunting 6, Magical Girl Spec-Ops Asuka 10, Mushoku Tensei 12, My Senpai Is Annoying 4, and The Sorcerer King of Destruction and the Golem of the Barbarian Queen 2 (also a final volume).

Square Enix has the 3rd Perfect Edition of Soul Eater.

Vertical debuts Haru’s Curse (Haru no Noroi), a josei title about a woman grieving for the death of her little sister from cancer. It’s a Zero-Sum title, and looks heavy but good.

MICHELLE: Looking forward to this one.

MJ: I am too.

ANNA: I’m always up for more josei, but maybe not heavy titles right now.

SEAN: Vertical also has The Daily Lives of High School Boys 4.

Viz debuts Assassin’s Creed: Legend of Shao Jun, which runs in Shogakukan’s Sunday GX. It follows the protagonist of the Assassin’s Creed: China game.

ASH: It’s interesting when franchises get split up between publishers like this. If you’re looking for other Assassin’s Creed manga, you have to look to Titan Comics.

SEAN: Going from A to Z, Viz also has Zom 100 – Bucket List of the Dead (Zom 100 – Zombie ni Naru Made ni Shitai 100 no Koto), also from Sunday GX. A corporate drone is exhausted and depressed. Then one day, he wakes up to a zombie apocalypse. His thoughts? “AWESOME!” This has some good buzz.

Also from Viz: Blue Flag 6, Golden Kamuy 20, Mermaid Saga Collector’s Edition 2, and Urusei Yatsura omnibus 9.

MICHELLE: Yay, Blue Flag!

ANNA: Yes!

ASH: Indeed! And yay to the second half of Mermaid Saga!

SEAN: Lastly, from Yen On, we get Solo Leveling. It’s a weak-to-strong dungeon crawl sort of book, which runs on the common trope these days of being able to see your stats like a game. It’s Korean, I believe, not Japanese.

Any of these pierce your heart with a shot of love?

My Friend’s Little Sister Has It In for Me!, Vol. 1

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By mikawaghost and tomari. Released in Japan as “Tomodachi no Imouto ga Ore ni dake Uzai” by GA Bunko. Released in North America by J-Novel Club. Translated by Alexandra Owen-Burns.

I’ve said this before, but sometimes you just want McDonald’s. You know that you could walk two more blocks and go to a nice steakhouse or an expensive Asian restaurant, but you can’t have that every day, and you feel like McNuggets, dammit. Sure, you’re probably going to get some bad along with the good, but you at least know exactly what you’re getting and are not surprised. This applies, believe it or not, to light novels as well. Sometimes I want to be amazed and transported to another world by wings of song, etc. And sometimes I want to read a harem comedy where the hero is as dense as lead and the heroines are all variations on “I hate you because I love you”. Good news! This book is McDonald’s. It won’t blow you away, but it will fill you up, and you know what? It came with a nice Apple Pie as a treat. (Have I finished grinding this metaphor into the dirt? Yes? Let’s get to the plot.)

Akiteru is our main character, and he has a lot on his plate. He’s the head of an amateur game development group, their new release is selling great, and he wants a job with his uncle, who runs a MUCH LARGER game company. The uncle agrees, on one condition: that he pretend to be his cousin’s boyfriend for the next year. She’s transferred schools after being bullied. And then there’s the titular little sister, who has apparently been reading the books of Takagi, Uzaki and Nagatoro and taken them to heart. She flirts aggressively with Akiteru, whose one main fault, as with most LN protagonists, is a complete inability to recognize anything as love. To him, her flirting is just plain mean bullying. And as for his cousin, well, she hates him too. Right?

To get the bad out of the way, there’s a character here who can be summed up as “shotacon”, and it’s as annoying as you’d expect. Also, the “friend” in the title gets very little to do, but I am hoping future books will change that. The reason I am hoping this is because the book’s chief strength is balancing out the love triangle that is forming around Akiteru with the game group he’s created, a tight-knit group of friends. Mashiro, the cousin, is the seeming newcomer to the group (though she has a rather obvious secret), and most of the second half is getting her introduced, loosening her up, and dealing with the bullying she had to content with at her previous school. I enjoyed that. Iroha, the little sister, is terrific, being obnoxious in the fun way rather than the irritating way. As for Akiteru, he’s hard to get a handle on. He does nice things, but his narration is basically “grumpy old cuss”, and he needs a shot in the arm of idealism. He’s not as bad as, say, Hachiman, but it can make him hard to read on occasion.

This just had an anime announced, and it’s not hard to see why – it isn’t due to the quality of the writing, it’s due to the fact that it checks a whole lot of ‘this should be an anime’ boxes. Despite reservations (see above), I think it’s the best of the three GA Bunko romcoms that J-Novel Club recently licensed. Fans of that genre who don’t mind the usual dense hero should get a kick out of this.

Slayers: The Silver Beast

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By Hajime Kanzaka and Rui Araizumi. Released in Japan by Fujimi Fantasia Bunko. Released in North America by J-Novel Club. Translated by Elizabeth Ellis.

This book really is starting to feel like the anime series by now, and not just because this is the first book to feature the “main cast” all together. The characterization is getting a bit broader – Gourry is dumber, Amelia is more justice-oriented, etc. I’d say the exception would be Lina, but as we see towards the end of the book, her own narration skews some things to make herself look smarter and savvier than she sometimes is. Zelgadis is back as well, though he’s still sort of the kinder, mellower Zelgadis at this point, at least when a cure for his chimera form is not being discussed. And, of course, as the cover shows, this is the book where we first meet up with a certain mysterious priest – though the volume alternates between “priest” and “monk” – who likes to tell everyone that things are a secret. With Xellos now joining us as well, it feels like the books may be headed for a climax… except they’re still pretty much stand alone.

While beating the crap out of random bandits, Lina, Gourry and Amelia run into a mysterious woman who ends up sealing Lina’s magic, then tells them to follow her to a nearby city, where it turns out there is a satanic cult! OK, it’s the Slayers equivalent of Satan, Shabranigdu, but still. Unfortunately, after another altercation, Amelia is captured and Gourry vanishes, leaving Lina on her own trying to meet back up with them again – and to kill the woman who sealed her magic, as that’s what will break the seal. She gets help on this end from Xellos, who is looking for a rumored copy of the legendary Claire Bible. As is Zelgadis, who’s also wandering around. Everything converges on the cult, who, as it turns out, are resurrecting the legendary Zanaffar, which turns out to be both a monster… and also not.

These books are still very short, so there’s not much room for characterization or plot development. Indeed, one grumble I had is that, after being set up as the Big Bad of the book, the woman who sealed Lina’s magic is killed casually, offscreen, by Xellos and never mentioned again. You get the sense that these books were very much written on the fly, without going back and checking on things. They’re still fun, though, with lots of big battles and dangerous moments for our heroes. Zel/Amelia shippers won’t get much from this book, as they barely interact, though they do seem to get along better than their anime selves. Lina/Gourry shippers don’t get much more, but after getting into an argument (and Lina hitting Gourry with a bedroom slipper she stuck into her backpack just so she could hit Gourry with it) Amelia tells them to stop it with the Couples Therapy. Which is cute.

Oddly, by the end of the book Xellos remains merely “a mysterious priest”, albeit a very powerful and suspicious one. I’m sure that will change. In any case, an9ime fans will be happy to see a lot of what drove slayers Next popping up here, and light novels fans will enjoy a relatively snack-sized action series.

Can Someone Please Explain What’s Going On?! ~A Sign-on-the-Line Wedding Story~, Vol. 5

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By Tsuredurebana and Rin Hagiwara. Released in Japan as “Dareka Kono Joukyou wo Setsumei Shite Kudasai! ~Keiyaku Kara Hajimaru Wedding~” by ArianRose. Released in North America by J-Novel Club. Translated by Emily Hemphill.

For all those whose favorite part of this series is the disconnect between Viola’s opinion of herself and what everyone else thinks of her, I have delightful news: this book is entirely about that. Indeed, at this point I think the most interesting – and impressive – part of the book is how no one is really sitting Viola down and explaining anything to her. They’re content to merely praise her, let it flow in one ear and out the other, and watch as she slowly (very slowly) figures things out. Now, part of this is that the writer doesn’t want her to suddenly wise up, as that means the series would almost be over. But it also shows that it’s Viola who needs to make the change and realize that she really is a gorgeous, trendy person. This also applies to her marriage – Cercis continues to be content – mostly – in waiting patiently for her to recognize his feelings. She’s still not there yet.

The book begins still on their belated honeymoon, and the most important thing that happens is when they tour the Fisalis mines and Viola takes a liking to the sapphires that have been left behind (because the miners are after the rarer rubies). Cersis decides to make these sapphires – which he renames Viola Sapphires – the hot new thing, and to have her show off how gorgeous they are. Of course, this also means she finally has to go out to parties again, so sadly very little puttering around in her maid outfit in this book. That said, as the book goes on, Viola slowly realizes that fashion and tastes have changed since she was last at an event – and everyone is now following HER. Even the blond ojou, who’d dropped her princess curls and upped her tsundere. Viola also now seems to get that Cersis really does love her. As for her own feelings… work in progress.

There’s a lot of good humor in this book. Some of it is overt, such as everything about the sapphires and Viola’s embarrassment, or Viola, after her near kidnapping in the last book, learning self-defense (and finding her maids all have daggers strapped to their thighs, which she calls sexy). Some of it is more subtle, mostly as Viola’s constant self-deprecation has become both amusing and annoying. Again, all Viola sees when she looks at herself is plain, flat-chested, and gawky, but she fails to realize that she’s basically Twiggy, setting the trend that everyone else has started to follow. Her bafflement at seeing all the other young women at the parties wearing simple hairdos and dresses is really funny. That said… I really hope we are reaching the end of Viola’s endearing bafflement soon. There is only so long you can string this out. I realize that we may never see her have a good opinion about her looks, but maybe we could at least get her to fall in love a bit? (I’d wonder if she’s ace, but this is not that kind of series.)

Despite a bit of frustration, this is a strong volume in a series that runs on light froth, and for those who want to see Viola walking arounnd looking stunning, it’s a must read.

Pick of the Week: Adults and Knights

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SEAN: Even Though We’re Adults. Boy, that was easy. Next?

KATE: This week, I’m all about the DRAMA–specifically, romantic drama. I second Sean’s recommendation of Even Though We’re Adults, but am also stoked for a new volume of Knight of the Ice. (No, it’s not as awesome as Tramps Like Us, but it is deliriously silly and fun.)

ANNA: Knight of the Ice! Who could fail to love this josei manga about socially awkward office lady’s romance with an otaku elite figure skater??? I am consistently delighted by each volume.

MICHELLE: These two definitely top my list, as well!

ASH: Multiple josei releases in the same week! It happens a little more frequently than it used to, but it still thrills my heart. The debut of Even Though We’re Adults will be getting most of my attention this time, but I have been enjoying Knight of the Ice, too.

MJ: Same here! I’m totally here for Knight of the Ice, though Even Though We’re Adults may be my ultimate pick. Either one could easily grab my vote!