Manga Bookshelf

Discussion, Resources, Roundtables, & Reviews

Features & Reviews

Fruits Basket another, Vol. 1

by

By Natsuki Takaya. Released in Japan by Hakusensha, serialization ongoing in the magazine Bessatsu Hana to Yume. Released in North America by Yen Press. Translated by Alethea and Athena Nibley.

There are some stories that cry out for sequels, leaving loose ends and plotlines that would easily carry a new series forward with exciting, fresh ideas. Then there are series that ended nearly perfectly, with pretty much everything resolved, and the idea of a sequel fills you with foreboding and a sense that it’s going to ruin the franchise. Such a series, I’m afraid, it’s Fruits Basket another, the next-generation sequel to one of the most beloved manga of all time. Note I said next-gen: apart from one or two minor characters in small roles (Hanajima’s brother is a teacher, for example), don’t expect any of the original cast in this first volume. Instead we see the sons and daughters of Sohma, who are blissfully not cursed, happy and content, and living the good life at the same high school their parents went to. There’s even a Sohma fan club run by the daughter of the Yuki fan club president. Into this lovely arrangement comes Sawa, our heroine.

The late, lamented Sayonara, Zetsubou-sensei introduced a girl named Ai Kaga, who thinks everything that she does is a bother to someone else and makes her feel tremendous guilt. It’s meant to be a parody. That said, if you took Ai and made her 100% serious, you’d come close to Sawa in this first volume. Sawa lives alone with her mother, whose absence is hinted to veer towards actual neglect. She suffers from amazingly low self-esteem, not helped by various childhood incidents that have only reinforced it. Now she’s in high school, but she’s late her first day because her landlord yelled at her for something that’s her mother’s fault. If Tohru was a ray of sunshine and hope into everyone’s lives, then Sawa is a black cloud floating overhead. Fortunately, she soon runs into Mutsuki and Hajime Sohma, the sons of Yuki and Kyo respectively. Soon she’s blackmailed into being on the Student Council and hanging out with more and more Sohmas, incurring the wrath of the girls of the school even as she wonders “why her?”.

The biggest question I have with this series is “why was it written?”. No, seriously. What new story needed to be told here beyond “oh look, Sohma kids!”? If Fruits Basket sometimes felt a bit like “every new Sohma gets to reveal their backstory and angst before being healed by the power of Tohru”, this is meant to be the exact opposite – despite the occasional stab at Mutsuki and Hajime having a “rivalry”, the fact is that the next-gen Sohmas are happy and content. Which is good, y’know, because we don’t exactly want to Fruits Basket main characters to be horrible parents, but it’s also fairly boring. As for Sawa, you can tell that Takaya is trying not to simply write Tohru Mk. 2, but her self-hatred really is through the roof – she’s not plucky like Tohru (or, for that matter, Sakuya and Liselotte) and so she simply grates.

There is a hint in the cliffhanger ending that we may see a Sohma who is not happy and content (Shigure and Akito’s kid – gosh, what a surprise), but for the most part the first volume of Fruits Basket another commits the cardinal sin of being deadly boring. And while normally I wouldn’t be pissed off about that sort of thing, the fact that it’s a sequel to one of my favorite shoujo series AND it’s also put Liselotte & Witch’s Forest (which I’d rather be reading) on hiatus just makes me more annoyed. If you loved the original Fruits Basket, preserve your memories and give this half-baked sequel a miss.

Kenka Bancho Otome, Vol. 2

by

Kenka Bancho Otome Volume 2 by Chie Shimada

Kenka Bancho Otome, with a storyline about a girl who is forced to dress up as a boy and attend a high school for juvenile delinquents, is an excessively silly manga, which one would expect from an otome game adaptation, but in just two volumes it manages to pull off being a fun summer read as long as the reader isn’t looking for deep thoughts.

In the concluding volume Hinako continues her misadventures at Shishiku Academy, where most of her new friends seem to be on the verge of falling in love with her in her top-secret disguise as her brother Hikaru. Yet another emotional minefield is introduced with the arrival of Houou Onigashima, an upperclassman with a tough-guy jacket that he constantly wears slung over his shoulders like a cape. Houou just happens to be Hikaru’s older brother and Hinako is overcome at the idea that she has yet another brother! But when she returns to tell Hikaru about her discovery he inexplicably becomes extremely upset. The rest of the volume consists of a summer vacation episode with plenty of shirtlessness, school sports day, where Hinako has to cross-dress as a cheerleader with provocative results and a bonus giant schoolyard fight where Hinako further strengthens her platonic friendships with Kira and Totomaru, much to their mystified chagrin. At two volumes long, this series wraps up more nicely than most two volume series, which sometimes suffer from the author being forced to resolve a bunch of plot points quickly in a final chapter. I would have been fine with 3 instead of 2 volumes, if there might have been a little more time to delve into the hints about Hinako’s unconventional family and have her embark on an actual romance. Overall, the art was attractive if a bit generic. I enjoyed the story enough that I would totally play the Otome game that the manga was based on if it came out on android!

kenka bancho otome 2

The Voynich Hotel, Vol. 1

by

By Douman Seiman. Released in Japan by Akita Shoten, serialized in the magazine Young Champion Retsu. Released in North America by Seven Seas. Translated by Alethea & Athena Nibley. Adapted by David Lumsdon.

I had heard buzz about The Voynich Hotel before it was licensed, mostly that it was dark and funny. Weird probably also came up, but I wasn’t really paying attention. I probably should have been. Before it is dark or funny (though it is both of those things), The Voynich Hotel is STRANGE. A lot of the time it’s content to be a mild gag comic about the staff and residents of a hotel in the South Pacific, but then people start getting killed, or selling drugs, or investigating the secret legend of the three sisters from this island’s past (one of whom seems very familiar). And in amongst this we manage to have the start of a vaguely sweet romance between a guest who’s hiding from… something, and one of the maids, who is cute and innocent and one of those is a lie. I’m not even sure where this series is going, save the fact that I suspect there will be more deaths soon.

Our hero is Taizou, a Japanese man who arrives at the hotel hiding from his old way of life. He ends up passing out, but is taken care of by the two maids who run the day-to-day affairs of the hotel: Helena is cute and spunky and excitable and also Maria from Zetsubou-sensei, and Berna is stoic and deadpan also also a Rei Ayanami clone. The cook is trying to kill herself and anyone else she can get to go with her, the owner wears a Mexican wrestling mask, and the residents are equally eccentric – you might say the manga artist was normal, except he’s trying to write a manga and make deadlines while living on this island. There’s also an assassin, and three more arrive during the course of the first book. The assassins are mostly what drive what there is of a plot, but for the most part you’re here to see weird people be funny.

Fortunately, I found it very funny, though you’ll need to set your sense of humor dial to ‘sick’. Leaving aside all the deaths, I have to say that Berna’s ringtone grossed me out but also had me in hysterics – let’s leave it at that. There are also a lot of “shout out” references in this volume, most of them blatant. Helena takes Taizou’s temperature with her head, which he says is so cliched even Mitsuru Adachi wouldn’t do that anymore… wait, no, he would. The police officers who parody Isaac Azimov’s Bailey and Olivaw are also a hoot, though they remind me that Seven Seas has once again rated this series T when it clearly isn’t – there’s no nudity, but reader beware. Possibly the strangest thing in the book, though, is that Taizou and Helena’s growing relationship is rather sweet – well, once she puts on a different shirt, that is.

The Voynich Hotel was very popular scanlated, so I worry that it will suffer the fate of other popular scanlated series licensed over here (I’m looking at you, Franken Fran). It requires a strong stomach at times, but the skewed tone of this series tickled me, and at only three volumes, I’m quite willing to read more.

Bookshelf Briefs 7/23/18

by , and Leave a Comment

Anonymous Noise, Vol. 9 | By Ryoko Fukuyama | Viz Media – The tour begins, but it’s already on the verge of falling apart. Nino simply isn’t playing very well, and Yuzu is falling apart because of his love for Nino, something that he is trying desperately to hide from her. Indeed, he ends up getting in such a swivet he loses his voice, prompting a trip to the doctor that may lead to him missing the start of the concert. And then there is Momo, dealing with his own career, and irritated as he waits for In No Hurry to reach the level they sho0uld be able to achieve. I was frequently frustrated by this volume, but the book’s last chapter works exactly like a great song, pushing closer and closer to a climax until it finally hits the last chorus in triumph. And then there’s a cliffhanger. End of song next book! – Sean Gaffney

The Bride & the Exorcist Knight, Vol. 1 | By Keiko Ishihara | Seven Seas – I wasn’t too sure about this premise. Anne is a young woman destined to be the bride of a demon. Instead, she’s saved by Haru, who is a male exorcist. He’s also twelve, and he says he’s going to marry her instead. The book, fortunately, emphasizes over and over not only that he’s too young to be talking about marriage but also that he really is an immature kid, despite being an amazing exorcist. Anne too is a good character, not content to be a helpless damsel but fighting in her own way to change fate. We don’t see much of Mephisto, her intended groom—though the cliffhanger suggests that will change. But provided you don’t mind the age issue too much, this is a cute and action-filled debut. – Sean Gaffney

Gabriel Dropout, Vol. 4 | By Ukami |Yen Press – the majority of this volume involves our four leads returning to heaven/hell (delete where applicable) in order to report on their time down in the world of humans. The gags are predictable but still fun—Gabriel is unable to bring her games to heaven, which proves rather dull, but at least she can bullshit her way past an easily suckered God. Meanwhile, Vignette is dealing with her adorable little pet being a lot bigger than she remembers (I was reminded of Gintama here), and Satanya has to deal with being herself—she tries to break into heaven and fails. Fortunately, we find out that the rest of her family (bar the “normal” younger brother) are just like her. This remains a very silly but amusing series. – Sean Gaffney

Go For It, Nakamura! | By Syundei | Seven Seas – Although there have already been several BL-adjacent manga released by Seven Seas, Go for It, Nakamura! is the publisher’s first real foray into the genre. The volume is an absolute delight. Nakamura is a gay high school student who has developed a crush on his classmate Hirose, but Nakamura’s introverted nature and general awkwardness mean that the two of them have barely even talked to each other. Go for It, Nakamura! is the perfect title for this manga–I couldn’t help but root for Nakamura as his friendship with Hirose slowly develops. The story is funny and charming and the characters immensely likeable. A bigger deal is made out of Nakamura being a fan of octupi than out of him being gay, a refreshing twist that is also resolved sweetly. Nakamura does occasionally have a dirty daydream, but overall, Go for It, Nakamura! is rather chaste and wholesome. I loved it. – Ash Brown

Haikyu!!, Vol. 25 | By Haruichi Furudate | Viz Media – Last time I commented on how delighted I was with Hinata’s character development and growth. That continues here, but as the training camps end and we resume practice it’s Kageyama who’s given a volume to really show off. In this case it’s not just that he’s grown, but the series also looks at the attitude that got him in trouble in middle school—the whole arrogant “King” thing—and wonders if it was the attitude or the rest of the team? After all, the Haikyu!! kids are unlikely to be cowed by Kageyama at this point. Particularly Tsukishima, who may need enough people being jerks towards him in order to really take off. Good stuff, though I suspect we may be getting more tournament games soon. – Sean Gaffney

Little Devils, Vol. 1 | By Uuumi | Seven Seas – This is supposed to be more than one volume, though I do wonder where it’s going to go from here. The premise is that the hero has defeated the demon king… which is now split into eleven adorable and bratty children (and one egg). Each chapter of this first volume introduces one of the children, shows off their eccentricities, and moves on. Some of the cast make reappearances (Asuka is clearly the “star” of the children), but for the most part this reads very much like an anthology. Fortunately, the kids’ eccentricities are enough to disguise the fact that the hero is super boring. The said, this really feels like it could have ended with the first volume, after the egg hatches and we get our twelfth devil. Can it keep up being sort of cute? – Sean Gaffney

Log Horizon: The West Wind Brigade, Vol. 9 | By Koyuki and Mamare Touno | Yen Press – We continue to deal with the odd golem creation that was introduced in the last book here—turns out Kuroe is part of a pair, and is not all that excited to join up with her other half, which is filled with hatred and despair, now that she’s gotten kindness from Soujiro and company. The evil golem creature is a pretty nasty opponent, eating Isaac’s black sword among other things, and the fact that it sort of looks like Soujiro with cat ears doesn’t help. I suspect this may be the final arc of this spin-off title, so I’m pleased it’s emphasizing the family aspect of the series rather than the comedy. Also, really nice fights. – Sean Gaffney

My Hero Academia: Vigilantes, Vol. 1 | By Hideyuki Furuhashi, Betten Court, and Kohei Horikoshi | VIZ Media –I was a little wary of this My Hero Academia offshoot, but it turned out to be more enjoyable than I expected. Nineteen-year-old Koichi Haimawari has a modest quirk—the ability to glide along surfaces—and has been spicing up his boring life by doing good deeds. One night, he runs into a grizzled old vigilante who calls himself Knuckleduster and becomes his apprentice. Knuckleduster is on a mission to track down the source of a drug called Trigger, which causes users to spontaneously undergo monstrous transformations. I didn’t expect this much plot, and Betten Court really nails Horikoshi’s art style. My only complaint is the fanservicey costume for the female vigilante, Pop-Step, who ends up in villainous clutches more than once, but I definitely like the family vibe the trio have going by volume’s end. I will surely be checking out volume two. – Michelle Smith

My Solo Exchange Diary, Vol. 1 | By Nagata Kabi | Seven Seas – One of the most critically acclaimed manga released last year was Kabi’s My Lesbian Experience with Loneliness. The sequel series My Solo Exchange Diary was therefore a welcome and perhaps obvious addition to Seven Seas’ catalog. Like its predecessor, My Solo Exchange Diary is an autobiographical work that will resonate strongly with many readers. Through the short essay manga collected in the series, Kabi continues to explore her experiences with anxiety, depression, and intense feelings of loneliness and how they impact her relationships and day-to-day life. Each chapter is framed as a diary entry written to her past self, at times offering advice and encouragement while at other times seeming to despair that she couldn’t have done some things differently. My Solo Exchange Diary can be brutally honest as Kabi struggles to find love, happiness, and self-worth, but it’s that honesty and authenticity that makes the series so compelling. – Ash Brown

Spirit Circle, Vol. 4 | By Satoshi Mizukami | Seven Seas – Spirit Circle has an overarching plot, but the way it’s being told also makes it feel like an excuse to do a series of short anthologies with a wraparound. Once again, the majority of this book is devoted to another of Fuuta’s past lives… and this one seems to be a future life, as he’s now Lafalle, a young man in charge of cleaning the chambers in a giant monolithic tower that house the brains of those that were killed but may one day be revived. As he gets older we see him interact with Kouko’s other self Lapis, and the two of them continue to have an odd bond that seems to lack any romantic feeling whatsoever—they even get married here, but it’s never consummated. This is well-written, but where is it going? – Sean Gaffney

The Unwanted Undead Adventurer, Vol. 2

by

By Yu Okano and Jaian. Released in Japan as “Nozomanu Fushi no Boukensha” by Overlap, Inc. Released in North America digitally by J-Novel Club. Translated by Shirley Yeung.

Last time I mentioned that I found Rentt fairly dull, but the story being told around him fascinating. Unfortunately, this second book sticks with Rentt the entire time, and suffers from it. It’s divided fairly evenly into fourths, each of which sees Rentt telling us about what’s going on very matter of factly. And speaking in that “I… am a zombie… sort of tone…” to boot. The stronger part of the book is at the start, as I really enjoyed the Bronze Adventurer test he took with the young adventurer couple. And the chat he had with Sheila was also good, though signposted something that I was hoping this book would avoid. (It’s a light novel series, guess what? It’s not avoided.) Unfortunately, the last two stories aren’t as interesting, and by the end of the book I found myself skimming, never a good sign when the ending features a fight to the death against a giant dragon creature.

The start, though, is very good. The test that Rentt and the adventurers he’s paired with take is quite vicious, which is fair given what adventurers of this level have to go through. More monsters than expected, ambushes from guild members, and also ambushes by other adventurers trying to take them out, given that only the one team who gets there first passes. This allows Rentt to show off his knowledge and experience. The adventurer couple are cliched (they reminded me a bit of the brother/sister team from Log Horizon) but cute. After this, we see that, as expected, Rentt’s attempt to hide himself by taking on a different last name and putting on a cloak and mask are not QUITE as effective as he’d imagined. Unfortunately, this then leads to the thing I thought we’d avoided. Sheila is clearly in love with Rentt, and when brought back to the house to meet Lorraine, Lorraine immediately knows it. I don’t really need undead harem adventures.

The third story has Rentt going to a village whose ritual sacrifice festival has gotten a bit too literal about its ritual sacrifices, and she steps in to save the day and figure out what’s going on is not as supernatural as people would think. The final story is the one ending in a cliffhanger, as Rentt takes on the task of finding a rare plant to help heal the head of an orphanage (the orphans are the ones hiring him). The most interesting part of this is when Rentt tries to kill a giant rat creature and instead finds himself getting a familiar, and a rather snarky one at that. Unfortunately, this is almost entirely Rentt by himself and Rentt without other people to bounce off of is far, far too dull. Things aren’t helped by the fact that, due to a rumor of adventurers disappearing, he has to stay out of the dungeons to avoid being suspicious. As a result, he’s stagnated a bit.

So now that we’ve had that dreaded second album syndrome, can things pick up? I believe they can, but I suspect it relies on how large the cast is for the third book. Too much Rentt can be deadly.

Kakafukaka, Vol. 1

by

By Takumi Ishida. Released in Japan by Kodansha, serialization ongoing in the magazine Kiss. Released in North America digitally by Kodansha Comics. Translated by Erin Proctor & Molly Rabbitt.

I’ve talked before about the fine balance that some titles need to walk with character development. It’s good to have characters with notable flaws, so that you can show them growing, learning, and changing. On the other hand, particularly in manga where a casual reader can drop a series after the first volume (when most stories have only just laid out the basics), if a character is too unlikable they risk annoying the reader too much. Kakafukaka is a josei series with two people who, at separate points and together, may grate on the reader’s nerves. The supporting cast also has its own issues, and there isn’t really a character that I can hang my hat on here and say “well, at least they’re sympathetic”. On the other hand, this sort of cast and plot is the reasonIe’ve been wanting more josei in the first place, and seeing these broken twenty-somethings blunder through life is why I’m here.

Aki is a young woman who feels it’s been a bit of a downhill slide since middle school. She’s drifting through life, can’t find a steady job, and has a self-loathing complex a mile wide. Oh, and she walked in on her boyfriend screwing another woman. Which means she’s now looking for a new place to live as well. Fortunately, one of her friends is getting married (which comes as a surprise, as she hadn’t told Aki yet) and is looking for someone to take her room in a share house she’s living in with three other boarders. To her surprise, she knows someone else who lives there: Tomoya was her classmate in middle school… and also the boy she lost her virginity to. That said, everything got awkward after that and they drifted apart. Now we’re ready to pick up where we left off? Not quite. Tomoya, it turns out, has erectile dysfunction… something that seems to be cured when he’s around Aki, much to his surprise and Aki’s discomfort. As a result, they reach a very uncomfortable agreement.

Kakafukaka’s issues are front and center, and also the point. Tomoya asks Aki to sleep in the same bed with him, both so that he can get a good night’s sleep (he’s been dwelling on this) and also so that he can see about curing himself. He promises not to “do anything dirty”, but as Aki herself notes, the entire premise kind of revolves around his getting hard when in contact with her. In addition, Tomoya is not all that happy with Aki’s super-low opinion of herself, one of the other flatmates has a crush on Tomoya to a disturbing degree, and Tomoya himself is simply hard to read – one of those “mild-mannered” mellow but stoic types that you see a lot of in titles like this, so Aki can’t help but receive mixed signals.

And so you have a series that shows a lot of promise, but has working against it the personalities of the two leads and the basic premise of their needing to be together. I’m optimistic that the series is going in a positive direction, but the reader might want to wait till a couple more volumes are out and read them in one big gulp.

Durarara!!, Vol. 10

by

By Ryohgo Narita and Suzuhito Yasuda. Released in Japan by ASCII Mediaworks. Released in North America by Yen On. Translated by Stephen Paul.

I had assumed that this would be another of those “all the plot guns fire off at once” volumes, but I was wrong. Indeed, Narita suggests he’s saving everything for the endgame, which is coming up soon. That is not to say that what’s in this volume is without interest. For one thing, we’re introduced to a new Big Bad, who not only lets all the Yodogiri Jinnais (yes, multiple) get crushed, but also gets to crush Izaya as well, something that always pleases me. What’s more, she seems to have a Saika’s power. This makes THREE independently running Saikas who can control people, as we have Anri, Haruna Niekawa (whose absence from her family life is a large plot point here as well), and now Kujiragi, the cliched “secretary secretly running everything behind the scenes”, who is also apparently older than she seems. She also has a fondness for cat puns. She’s a cool new character.

Thought Erika and Walker are hamming it up, Kadota’s presence on the cover is no accident, though it’s his absence that drives most of the plot. What’s been happening in Ikebukuro lately has been like a grenade about to go off, and the two things that stop it going off are Shizuo (because of sheer physical strength) and Kadota (because he’s the Only Sane Man in this entire series). So when Kadota is hospitalized by a passing mystery car, and Shizuo is arrested by cops for… well, they’ll think of some crime or another… all hell is ready to break loose. That said, it’s made clear in their scenes together that Erika is on a more even keel whenever she’s with Anri. She may be a fangirl of Anri’s supernatural powers, but she also knows that Anri needs a big sister, and when she fulfills that role she can avoid running around town threatening everyone with a car and a motive, the way Walker and Togusa do.

It’s been a while since we checked in on the three ‘main’ cast members (though, as always, Narita insists the star of Durarara!! is Celty). Mikado continues his downward slide, though at least we see he hasn’t gone full villain when he gets totally terrified on meeting Akabayashi. It’s hard to sympathize with Mikado, and I get the feeling that if he admits that he’s doing this so that he can feel excitement and be “special”, he’ll have lost. So he blunders on, not really caring that Aoba is just using him. Masaomi seems to be thinking that the best way to get through to Mikado is to kick the crap out of him till he’s a sweet boy again, and has mobilized the Yellow Squares to do this. As for Anri, all she wants is for things to go back to where they were so the three of them can have their talk. Unfortunately, that’s not going to happen, and I suspect the presence of two other Saikas will goad her into more definitive action next time.

So the pot is still simmering, but the stew inside it is smelling even more delicious. DRRR!! proper ends with the 13th book (please don’t ask about SH yet, I beg of you), so we’ll see how much more setup can be forced in before Narita simply has to serve it all up.

Manga the Week of 7/25/18

by , , , and 1 Comment

SEAN: It’s Yen Press week next week, and you know what that means, folks: a whole ton of books. But first, other publishers.

Dark Horse has a 10th volume of Blood Blockade Battlefront, which has gotten to 10 volumes in a mere 7 years.

J-Novel Club has a 4th How NOT to Summon a Demon Lord, whose (I assume toned-down) anime is now airing in Japan.

Kodansha print has one lone title, the 16th volume of Yamada-kun and the Seven Witches.

Digitally, though, it’s an avalanche. We begin with next week’s digital debut, Is Kichijoji the Only Place to Live? (Kichijouji Dake ga Sumitai Machi Desu ka?). It’s from Kodansha’s Young Magazine the 3rd, and is about two sisters who work in real estate. You know those odd seinen titles with minimal art you always saw in Japanese bookstores but they never got licensed? This is one of those. I am looking forward to it.

MICHELLE: It really looks great.

ASH: Oh! It does!

SEAN: There’s also Ace of the Diamond 13, Defying Kurosaki-kun 2, Kokkoku: Moment by Moment 8, Liar x Liar 4, The Prince’s Black Poison 6, The Quintessential Quintuplets 2, Shojo FIGHT! 4, and Until Your Bones Rot 7. I’m behind on Shojo FIGHT!, but determined to catch up.

MICHELLE: I’m glad this is starting to come out more frequently. Also, yay for more Ace of the Diamond.

ANNA: I’m also behind on Shojo FIGHT! but planning on catching up too!

SEAN: One Peace has a 9th volume of the manga adaptation of The Rise of the Shield Hero.

Seven Seas has two debuts. The first is the manga adaptation of Didn’t I Say to Make My Abilities Average in the Next Life?!, whose novel Seven Seas has also been releasing. The manga runs in Comic Earth Star, and I hope it’s as silly as its source.

The other title, highly anticipated, is The Voynich Hotel, a darkly comedic horror title that ran in Akita Shoten’s Young Champion Retsu. Various anime forums have praised this to the skies, so I’m interested.

MICHELLE: I’m curious about this one, but will probably wait to see some reviews before I commit.

ANNA: Me too.

ASH: This one has me intrigued, as well.

MJ: What Michelle said. Times ten.

SEAN: Seven Seas also has the 11th Servamp.

Vertical gives us a 12th Cardfight!! Vanguard.

Viz has nothing in print, but digitally has a 6th élDLIVE.

ASH: Nothing new in print, but Banana Fish is being reprinted, hooray!

MJ: YEEESSSSSSSSSSSSSSS!

SEAN: Breaking News! Viz is finally dipping its toes into josei! Mari Okazaki’s Will I Be Single Forever? (Zutto Dokushin de Iru Tsumori?) debuts digitally next week. It’s a one-volume collection of “interconnected stories”, and ran in Shodensha’s Feel Young magazine. Readers with long memories may recall Okazaki’s Suppli.

ASH: I do, and fondly!

MICHELLE: Ooh! I’d really been wanting to see Viz do more digital stuff! Maybe this is them sort of testing the waters.

ANNA: I enjoyed Suppli! I think I still have the volumes somewhere in my house. I am excited for this!

ASH: I’ve held onto my copies, too!

MICHELLE: Me, too! I never gave up hope on it being finished in English one day.

And then there’s Yen, which has a whoooole lot, even with some of its light novels being shifted to next week. Let’s start with debuts.

Did you love the epilogue to Harry Potter? Did you wish that all the love you had for that epilogue was applied to your favorite shoujo manga? Then you’ll adore Fruits Basket another, which gives us the next generation of most of the cast and ruins every fanfic ever. I have… strong opinions about this sequel, but I will save them for the review.

MICHELLE: I just don’t know what to think here. I haven’t read any of it, so I will give it a try, but… what story is left?

ANNA: Yeah. Um. Will wait for other reviews, I guess.

MJ: I’m dying. Dying. Mainly from Sean’s comments. I think instead of Fruits Basket another, I will just read some things by Sean.

SEAN: Hakumei and Mikochi: Tiny Little Life in the Woods is a new title that ran/runs in Enterbrain’s “sui generis” magazines Fellows! And Harta. It’s tiny girls living a tiny life, as you’d expect. Fantasy slice-of-life from Enterbrain will ALWAYS be on my plate.

ASH: Same. This series looks adorable.

SEAN: Ibitsu is for those who need more creepy horror in their lives, and I can be thankful it’s done in one omnibus. It ran in Young Gangan, and is so not my thing but I know has a big audience.

ASH: I have a general interest in horror manga, creepy or not, so I’ll probably check this one out at some point.

SEAN: School of Horns is a Young Ace Up title that looks like it straddles that vague “is this BL or not?” line. It’s about students at a magic school who can control magic, and one boy whose horns are smaller than the others, making him self-conscious. >_>

MICHELLE: Um…

ANNA: Ha ha, well that certainly sounds emblematic of the genre.

MJ: I’m. Uh. Yeah.

SEAN: I hate giving away my Pick of the Week, but I am so hyped for Teasing Master Takagi-san (Karakai Jouzu no Takagi-san), which also has a recent anime. It runs in Shogagukan’s Gessan magazine, and is about a short, easily embarrassed boy in middle school and the girl who loves to tease him. I review it here.

There are ongoing Yen titles as well, of course. Akame Ga KILL! 15, A Certain Magical Index 14, the 2nd in Durarara!!’s Re;Dollars arc, Gabriel Dropout 4, DanMachi: Sword Oratoria 4, Kakegurui: Compulsive Gambler 6, Laid-Back Camp 3, Log Horizon: The West Wind Brigade 9, Murcielago 7, The 7th Overlord manga volume, a 3rd A Polar Bear in Love, The Royal Tutor 8, Sacrificial Princess and the King of Beasts 2, the 5th Sekirei omnibus, a 3rd So I’m a Spider, So What? manga volume, the 2nd Sword Art Online Alternative: Gun Gale Online manga, an 11th Taboo Tattoo, the 3rd and final omnibus for Umineko When They Cry: Requiem of the Golden Witch (one more arc to go after this!), and the 3rd Val x Love.

ANNA: I still need to read Sacrificial Princess and the King of Beasts 1!

ASH: I enjoyed the first volume, and I think you might like it, too! I’m also looking forward to reading more of A Polar Bear in Love.

SEAN: Please try not to sob as you look at this list. But what are you getting from it?

Teasing Master Takagi-san, Vol. 1

by

By Soichiro Yamamoto. Released in Japan as “Karakai Jouzu no Takagi-san” by Shogakukan, serialization ongoing in the magazine Gessan. Released in North America by Yen Press.

It’s a cliche, and a controversial one these days: “Boys just tease the girls because they like them”. And so naturally some enterprising young manga artist wondered, “what would happen if the genders were reversed?”. Well, as it turns out, it’s adorable. The premise here is that Nishikata is a desperately over-earnest young man with a propensity for blushing at anything who is trying desperately to prank his classmate Takagi-san, who sits next to him in class. The trouble is, he’s pretty easy to read. Also, he can’t keep his emotions in check. He’s also far too nice to seriously prank anyone. But mostly he fails because Takagi-san is simply too good at it. In a contest of who can make the over blush first, she wins every single time. Fortunately, all she asks for (mostly) is that he react the way he does. What we have here is My Neighbor Seki if there actually was any romantic tension between the two leads.

There is a certain risk here, which I think the author knows. Takagi-san’s teasing has to go so far and no farther, i.e. she can’t just be mean. You can argue she gets Nishikata in trouble with the teacher, but honestly that’s mostly his own inability to keep himself grounded. We also see her lay off when she thinks that he’s genuinely sick – something which actually seems to bother him. The reason that this sort of thing is all acceptable is that it’s clear that Takagi-san is over the moon for Nishikata. Indeed, her teasing in the final chapter of this volume relies on her being able to lie when she tells him “secretly” that she likes him – because the lie is that’s it’s secret. Others in the classroom wonder if they’re a couple already, and were this a traditional romance manga I bet the guys would be jealous of the “lucky bastard”. We’re meant to see this as courtship – and yes, it does work mostly because the genders are reserved.

The manga ran for about three years in “Gessan Mini” before moving to the main magazine, and the first volume’s chapters do seem to be the sort that can be enjoyed in any order and whether you know the characters or not. The teasing ranges from typical middle-school stuff (making funny faces, tossing aluminum cans) to more personal things (why Takagi-san isn’t swimming in PE today, sharing an umbrella in the rain). Throughout it all, Nishikata remains 100% oblivious to any affection that Takagi-san may have for him, and the one time that he does seem to get it when she tells him directly, she backs off. You get the sense she wants him to figure his feelings out first. You also get the sense there’s no real rush. They’re only middle-schoolers, so she has all the time in the world to watch his face.

The series had a recent anime (which is likely why it moved to the main magazine), so readers may go in knowing what’s going to happen to a degree. Don’t let that stop you from getting this. The pacing is excellent, and the characters are cute. Nishikata is the hero, but you get the sense that if he ever won the manga would end, so you’re rooting for Takagi-san. Mostly as those faces ARE pretty adorable.

The Adventure Zone: Here There Be Gerblins

by

By Clint McElroy, Griffin McElroy, Justin McElroy, Travis McElroy, and Carey Pietsch | Published by First Second

I’m a newcomer to The Adventure Zone podcast (only 24 episodes in at this point, so no spoilers, please!) but quickly fell deeply in love with it. My timing was good, actually, because it just about coincided with the release of the graphic novel based on the first arc of the podcast’s first season (also known as the Balance campaign). Initially, I thought I’d simply enjoy the graphic novel instead of reviewing it because the podcast is so important to me. It’s been a really tough year and The Adventure Zone made me laugh and gave me something new to feel enthusiastic about, and for that I will be forever grateful. Happily, however, the print adaptation is just so damned good that I find I have to talk about it!

The Adventure Zone started as a special episode of the McElroy brothers’ long-running and much beloved podcast My Brother, My Brother and Me, but proved so popular that it became a series in its own right. Summed up by eldest brother Justin McElroy as “the story of four idiots that played D&D so hard that they made themselves cry,” it’s the story of a human fighter named Magnus (created by Travis), an elf wizard named Taako (created by Justin), and a dwarf cleric named Merle (created by the boys’ father, Clint) who find themselves working for an organization that’s trying to round up and dispose of dangerous magical relics. They’re guided by youngest brother Griffin, who serves as Dungeon Master and portrays a fantastic array of NPCs. The improvisatory results are hilarious, profane, and wonderfully endearing. And, eventually, capable of evoking tears, though I haven’t gotten to that part yet. I love that the family known for a goofy advice podcast started The Adventure Zone as a lark and ended up creating something genuinely moving.

The graphic novel adaptation is not a word-for-word copy of the podcast. Most of the out-of-character moments have been omitted, and what remains almost reads purely as a fantasy story, except that Griffin occasionally pops in to request perception checks or give out inspiration points, which reminds readers that there are unseen players behind the characters on the page. It’s a neat way to focus on the world the McElroys created without completely shutting them out of it. Some of the dialogue is different (though many favorite quips have made the cut) and some of the names are different (licensing issues, one assumes) and a couple of pivotal events play out a bit differently, but the feeling is the same.

Plot-wise, at this point in the story the trio of adventurers is doing a job for Merle’s cousin, Bogard, who has hired them to convey some of his belongings to another town. Along the way, they come upon evidence that Bogard and his bodyguard, Barry Bluejeans, have been abducted by gerblins. Now our heroes must save them! Along the way, they discover a mine renowned for its mystical ore, an evil drow named Magic Brian who is after something particular that our heroes can’t seem to make out, and an orc woman named Killian who is so impressed by their skills that she takes them to meet her employer. Also, Taako gets a cool umbrella staff! (Really, Taako is the best.)

What’s neat is that, given that the McElroys started working on the adaptation after the Balance campaign concluded, they’re able to add some foreshadowing along the way, like a certain character’s cameo appearance or a seemingly very significant pause when Killian’s boss sees the guys for the first time. (I haven’t finished Balance, so I don’t know what this is foreshadowing, but I’m sure it’s something!) Too, Carey Pietsch’s art (so fun and expressive throughout) includes some in-jokes for McElroy fans, the most adorable travel montage ever, and a dramatic reveal that literally gave me goosebumps. I especially appreciated getting to actually see Magnus engage in various foolhardy exploits. This volume ends with a teaser for the adaptation of the next arc—Murder on the Rockport Limited—and I’m really looking forward to seeing how Pietsch depicts Magnus’ more inspired feats from that adventure.

Ultimately, I’d say that the podcast is funnier, whereas the graphic novel presents a more cohesive story. Both are fantastic, and I recommend them heartily. Lastly, I’ll close with this excellent fan film made using audio from the podcast. If you’re not familiar with The Adventure Zone, this will give you an idea of the lovable silliness that awaits.

The Magic in This Other World Is Too Far Behind!, Vol. 4

by

By Gamei Hitsuji and himesuz. Released in Japan by Overlap. Released in North America digitally by J-Novel Club. Translated by Hikoki.

You get the sense that this is the book where the author and publisher realized that it was enough of a success to start planning larger plots in the future. This isn’t as easy to assume these days since most of the light novels put out lately tend to be based on webnovels that are already 7-8 volumes ahead of publication, but it does have that feel. Suimei finally reunites with Reiji and Mizuki here, if only temporarily. We resolve the plots from the previous book, and gain a new “harem” member. And we get introduced to a whole buttload of villains at the end of the book, including one who had seemingly been an ally before. Yes, if Suimei is able to take care of villains with ease, and if Reiji’s party is hiding a secret master swordsman, then you also need to step up on the villain game. In the meantime, though, this gives the reader what they want: Suimei being cool, lots of fighting, and Lefille not being a loli anymore. Well, at least *I* wanted that.

The book can be fairly simply divided into its good and bad points. As usual, I like to start with the bad and work towards the good. So it has to be said, Liliana really loses out here. On the run, getting the crap beaten out of her by mooks, and finally rescued by Suimei, she’s not allowed to help out in clearing her name because of the nature of dark magic and how she’s essentially been brainwashed by the villain into using it. Understandable, but it does make her an absolute damsel in distress. Also, unless you’re a hardcore gamer or fantasy buff, the endless lectures on magic theory are going to numb your mind fast. They may be coached in different terms, but this is absolutely the equivalent of those isekai books where the heroes talk about leveling up their XP in morbid detail. So I’m a Magician, So What?

On the bright side, where Liliana falters Felmenia shines. She too got a bit of a raw deal in the first book, and has mostly been following Suimei out of a bit of lovestruck crushing. But she’s clever and very quick to learn, and is also a magic powerhouse, something that Suimei is well aware of. I didn’t like his endless lectures, but I very much did like his trusting her to hold off the cavalry (Graziella, who reminds me a bit of an evil Olivier Armstrong, and the other hero Elliot, who is much less of a womanizing creep here). And as I indicated, we get the return of regular-sized Lefille, kicking ass and taking names. Not sure if she’s still cursed (I suspect yes), but we’ll cross that bridge when we come to it. I also liked the poignant relationship between Liliana and her adopted father.

There’s more I could get into (the idea that no one bothers to search Suimei’s place for Liliana for several days beggars belief, and I didn’t even mention Little Miss “I’m hiding my super awesome fighting skills so I can seem more girly and attractive”), but you get the idea. I’m less wild about Too Far Behind than I was when it first came out, but it’s still pretty solid, and the books are also fairly lengthy, so you get bang for your buck. Light novel fans will enjoy this.

(Note: the lack of illustrations beyond the color pages was apparently a feature of the Japanese version as well, in case you were wondering.)

Go for It, Nakamura!

by

By Syundei. Released in Japan as “Ganbare! Nakamura-kun!!” by Akaneshinsha, serialized in the magazine Opera. Released in North America by Seven Seas.

It may come as a surprise that I’m reviewing a title like this – I try not to be one of those “girl on girl is hot, but guys ew!” fans, but it has to be said that BL is not a genre I generally cover. But there was a big buzz about this title and its style, and it’s also done in one. The main reason I likely picked it up to review was that it made me nostalgic for the old days of manga. The art style is right out of the Ranma 1/2 and KOR playbook, and I was pleased to see that once I started reading the book, the humor was as well. Indeed, Ranma fans might find themselves thinking that if you took Gosunkugi from that series and made his obsession a guy rather than Akane, it wouldn’t be too far off from our titular hero here. The main reason to read the book is Nakamura, who is a big introvert, has an otaku-esque obsession with octopuses, and is, overall, a bit of a hot mess.

Nakamura is also gay, which is probably why you’re seeing this series run in the BL magazine Opera rather than, say, Weekly Shonen Sunday. The object of his affection, who you see dotted around the front cover, is Hirose, who is a nice, extroverted, upbeat young man – he’s the sort who’d be the “best friend of the hero” in a typical manga. Nakamura wants to be more than friends, but he can’t even work his way past that first hurdle. As the volume goes on, we see Nakamura work himself into a frenzy trying to get the courage to have a normal conversation with Hirose. There’s drawing him in art class. There’s helping out with the school play. He’s even getting dating advice from a BL manga. Admittedly, it’s a BL manga involving anthropomorphic train bento, so he’s not having much luck there. It takes a class trip and an aquarium to finally get Nakamura and Hirose to communicate properly, and though there’s no relationship at the end, the friendship step has finally been conquered.

As you may have gatehred, the main reason to get this book is the humor. It’s simply very funny in a lot of places – Nakamura’s imagined smooth conversations leading to romance are also fun and relatable, and it’s also great to see him fretting. As the cast expands (I liked the author’s note where they said they were worried about adding girls to a BL manga) we also get new veins of humor that aren’t just Nakamura’s somewhat obsessive personality – poor Kawamura has a crush on Nakamura, but he’s only interested in her sketches of him and Hirose, and the occult club president is scheming and clever – in most other titles she’s the sort who’d be the newspaper club girl. That said, the main reason to read this is Nakamura, and seeing his fumbling attempts to get closer to Hirose, which do finally pay off. The ending is rather sweet.

In the end, I’m glad I picked this up. It was entertaining, and if you want to start off your BL reading on the milder side, it’s a good choice.

Bookshelf Briefs 7/17/18

by , and Leave a Comment

Cutie Honey a Go Go! | By Shimpei Itoh | Seven Seas – Over the years Go Nagai’s Cutie Honey has seen numerous incarnations, including live-action, anime, and manga adaptations. Cutie Honey a Go Go!, a collaboration between manga creator Shimpei Itoh and Hideaki Anno, is directly based on Nagai’s original manga. The short manga series has been collected in its entirety along with additional material in a single, action-packed volume. Although I have been aware of Cutie Honey for quite some time, Cutie Honey a Go Go! was actually my entrée into the franchise. It’s a tremendous amount of fun, even considering that Itoh had to wrap up the manga earlier than hoped. The story about an endearing super-powered android and the gun-toting investigator keeping tabs on her ends rather abruptly as a result, but the series’ likeable characters and terrific sense of humor more than make up for that fact. The manga is full of capable, kick-butt women. – Ash Brown

Fairy Tail S, Vol. 2 | By Hiro Mashima | Kodansha Comics – A good number of Fairy Tail spin-offs, sequels, and prequels have already been translated with even more to come, a testament to the franchise’s popularity. While some of those manga are accessible to those unfamiliar with the original, Fairy Tail S is definitely intended for established fans. It’s a short series, only two volumes, collecting a variety of omake, side stories, crossovers, four-panel comics, and other short Fairy Tail manga. One of the crossovers in the second volume of Fairy Tail S is with Hitoshi Iwaaki’s Parasyte (also recently published in the Neo-Parasyte M anthology) while another is with Hiro Mashima’s own Rave Master. Most of the stories tend towards the humorous and include a fair amount of fanservice, but some do have more serious, heartfelt moments, too. Lucy features prominently in the second volume though many of the other characters get their time in the spotlight as well. – Ash Brown

Go For It, Nakamura! | By Syundei | Seven Seas –The retro-looking Takahashi-esque cover for Go For It, Nakamura! promised a cute story and that’s exactly what it delivers. Sixteen-year-old Okuto Nakamura has known since he was very young that he’s gay, and when he spies adorable Aiki Hirose at the opening ceremony, he falls in love. Nakamura is shy, however, and has trouble approaching Hirose. After a couple of incidents that go awry, he soon begins to make some headway, courtesy of things like filling in for a dramatic performance, scaring off some bullies, and being the victim of an overly friendly cockroach. It’s adorable and sweet and completely teen-rated, which makes it a good choice if you’re in the mood for standalone brain balm. – Michelle Smith

Haikyu!!, Vol. 25 | By Haruichi Furudate | VIZ Media – Hinata continues to use the opportunity to observe at the prefectural rookie camp to great advantage, and ends up seeing something that actually enables him to help one of the participants. This serves him well once he’s back with his regular team, as he notices that Tsukishima is capable of more, which prompts Kageyama to (after some arguing and angst) decide that maybe it’s okay to bring back his king persona if it means he can demand the best from his teammates. Everyone’s getting better, which is nifty, but I’m especially keen to see how much better Hinata really has gotten at defense after his time away. I thought Haikyu!! was good before, but now it feels like it’s getting even better! I am so down for that. – Michelle Smith

Himouto! Umaru-chan, Vol. 2 | By Sankakuhead | Seven Seas – The series here (despite the presence of a few “pilots” at the end) seems to have settled into what it wants to be. We get Motoba fully integrated into the cast, becoming convinced that the blobby “indoor” Umaru is actually the little sister of the Umaru she knows. We get a bit of backstory for Ebina, and find out why she seems to be crushing on Taihei so hard. (He’s the only one who didn’t greet her by staring at her large breasts.) I do wish we’d see a bit more of the contrast between the two Umarus, and perhaps a bit more school stuff (the two could combine, in fact), but I understand why it’s easier to write for blobby Umaru. This is not high art, but is amusing moe fun. – Sean Gaffney

Kaguya-sama: Love Is War, Vol. 3 | By Aka Akasaka | Viz Media – The cover this time has Ai, Kaguya’s childhood friend, maid, and minder, not in that order, and she gets a couple of chapters to herself. The bigger deal here, though, is the introduction of Yu Ishigami, another member of the student council, who is a capable treasurer but filled with depression and paranoia. He has a great ability to read the room except when it will get him into trouble, and he’s absolutely terrified of Kaguya, who thinks he gets in the way of her machinations against Miyuki too much. And then there’s Chika, still my favorite, who manages to be super innocent while at the same time more worldsly than Kaguya, and also discovers that training Miyuki will always bring pain. Hilarious. – Sean Gaffney

Kiss Him, Not Me!, Vol. 14 | By Junko | Kodansha Comics – Kiss Him, Not Me ends here, and it does a very good job of wrapping up its storylines. We see Kae and Mutsumi as nervous virgins (the high point of the book may be Yusuke, the non-virgin, having to advise everyone else on sex). We negotiate the dreaded “I am going to college far from you” speedbump, and see Kae actually abandoning her BL obsessions for study so that she can eventually join him. And we see a wedding—and yes, Kae is fat for it, but it is for once not for the sake of comedy (much), and given she fits in her dress fine you suspect they planned for it anyway. We even get to see a kid, who is (of course) named Shion. And, though there were annoying hints, they avoided making Shima het at the last minute. Good job. – Sean Gaffney

One-Punch Man, Vol. 14 | By ONE and Yusuke Murata | Viz Media – One-Punch Man puts its humor on the back burner for the most part in this volume. It helps that Saitama is absent from about 2/3 of it. The gist of it is Goketsu, a monster who used to be human, showing up at the tournament to offer the other participants a chance to turn into monsters as well—or die. What follows shows off the difference between those who are heroes to protect or save people, and those who are heroes to show off how powerful they are. Suiryu gets the bulk of the character development here, though he mostly gets his ass kicked. But let’s face it, the main reason to read this is the absolutely gorgeous action sequences, which are almost works of art. I’m hoping for more funny stuff next time, though.-Sean Gaffney

The Water Dragon’s Bride, Vol. 6 | By Rei Toma | Viz Media – This went from “solid shoujo” to “lights-out fantastic” in one volume, and I’m still stunned. When the dragon god realizes that just being his priestess is putting Asahi in danger, he tries to fix it. And tries again. And then tries again. Each attempt is amazing to read—he tries putting her in a fake life back on Earth where fun times keep repeating, but she notices. Then he tries memory erasure, which doesn’t work. Finally he does something I was honestly not expecting to see—he genuinely sends her home. Home a good decade or so later, apparently, and she now has a rather grumpy little brother. But her heart is still back in the fantasy world, and with the Water God. My guess is she’s back at the start of book seven. Fantastic. – Sean Gaffney

The Isolator, Vol. 4

by

By Reki Kawahara and Shimeji. Released in Japan by ASCII Mediaworks. Released in North America by Yen On. Translated by Jenny McKeon.

This is the first time we’ve had a villain as the cover girl of this series, though it is not the Stinger of the subtitle, who we never quite get a good look at and may not even be completely human. Instead it’s Liquidizer, who was the evil mentor to our hero’s evil counterpart Trancer in the third book. Both of them have major roles in the fourth book as well, which seems designed to show that it’s not merely a case of Good Guys vs. Bad Guys here. This is, frankly, much appreciated, as whenever Kawahara tries to show off how evil his bad guys are the result is never all that good. I’m all for nuance if it keeps us away from mad ranting and rape threats. Even better, as Minoru’s overall psyche improves so does the series. He angsts here, yes, but far less than the previous books. There are even good things happening! Overall, it pleases me, as it means that, while not a book filled with happiness and sunshine, The Isolator is no longer a depressing slog.

We pick up right where we left off (like Accel World, Isolator is not really interested in down time), right after the last big battle with Trancer and Liquidizer. Minoru is jogging around, awkwardly chatting with his high school friend Tomomi (who may have lost her memories of their traumatic battle, but still has a giant crush on him), and getting some New Year’s mochi, which he shares with the Professor. If you think this may sound a bit like a harem protagonist, you’re not wrong, but Minoru’s Charlie Brown-ish sort of personality keeps things from getting too cliched. At the same time, Trancer and Liquidizer are licking their wounds and talking about what to do next. We get this from Trancer’s viewpoint, and also get a bit of his backstory, as he has a frozen childhood friend in a warehouse that he’s sort of hoping the Ruby Eyes can fix, even though she’s pretty dead. You get the sense that the choice between “jet eyes” and “ruby eyes” may be purely arbitrary.

The main problem – for both groups – arises with The Stinger (another lame Jet Eyes code name), whose gender and appearance is unknown but who can apparently do absolutely anything with insects, including gruesomely killing several soldiers and civilians, and trying to kill both Minoru AND Trancer. The most interesting thing about this half of the book is seeing Trancer’s hatred and self-loathing get the better of him, as he becomes convinced that this is an assassin sent by his organization because he failed them. This leads to a wonderful heartwarming moment, which is all the more amazing given it’s Kawahara writing villainous depth, where Liquidizer shows she does, in fact, care about Trancer’s well-being. It all leads to a cliffhanger, and who knows where we’ll go from here, but it’s a wonderful thing to see.

There are other things going on I didn’t talk about much, such as whether Minoru’s shell can heal the comatose and possibly have a connection with his sister in heaven (I’m winning to bet “no” on that second one), but I’ll save that for the next book, which may come out in 2020 given the author’s other projects. Still, this was probably the best book in the series, and Minoru proves to be an excellent protagonist when he’s not moping. Worth the wait.

Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba, Vol. 1

by

By Koyoharu Gotouge. Released in Japan by Shueisha, serialization ongoing in the magazine Weekly Shonen Jump. Released in North America by Viz.

It has to be said that the title of this series is not its strong point – you get the sense that they kept the Japanese title as a subtitle in order to make it searchable on Amazon, separated from the countless other demon slayers. The premise, too, seems to be fairly traditional and straight down the middle. A young man living with his family out in the boonies (it’s later shown this is the Taisho era – around the 1910s or so) returns home one day to find his family slaughtered and his sister a demon. A demon hunter also shows up to take care of the sister, but her brother defends her, and proceeds to try to a) learn how to get stronger so he can protect his sister, and b) try to find out how to stop her wanting to eat humans. The latter is easily done as she simply comas her way out of the story after a bit, so the former takes precedence. This means the series lives and dies on its action sequences.

The good news is that the action sequences are good. There’s lots of horrific images, and this is not a manga to read if you don’t want to see limbs flying off and people you love lying in a pool of their own blood. Tanjiro is a very earnest young lad in everything he does, and he takes on his training in that mode as well – he is here to SAVE HIS SISTER and kill demons, and he’s all out of sister. He’s a nice kid at heart, which proves to be a bit of a stumbling block for everyone teaching him about demon slaying, as they think he’s not suited for it. He proves to be far more effective than they’d expected, though. His training is not the most original in the world (I have to split that giant boulder in only one blow?), but I was never bored, and the demon we meet in the cliffhanger is pretty damn awful. You want Tanjiro to succeed and be able to save his sister.

The sister, unfortunately, is the weak link here, as once she’s a demon she doesn’t really get to speak. There was a brief moment when I thought she might actually be the comic relief – the bit where we see her bottom half sticking out of the far-too-small basket Tanjiro brought to carry her made me laugh out loud. Sadly, it’s about the only comedic bit in this otherwise very serious series, and once he actually starts his training she rather conveniently slips into a coma so that she’s not off trying to eat people while he gets stronger. I am hopeful that she will wake up, and slightly less hopeful that she might gain some character depth as well. The series is 11+ volumes in Japan, so clearly we have a ways to go. But this is a good start, if a bit straight-laced and serious minded. I’d read it if you enjoy horror/action in an about equal ratio.