Reviews

Wandering Son, Vol. 5

October 23, 2013 by Ash Brown

Creator: Takako Shimura
U.S. publisher: Fantagraphics Books
ISBN: 9781606996478
Released: September 2013
Original release: 2006

The fifth volume of Takako Shimura’s manga series Wandering Son was originally published in Japan in 2005 while the English-language edition of Wandering Son, Volume 5 was published by Fantagraphics in 2013. The entire series is being released in English as beautiful hardcovers; Fantagraphics’ treatment of the manga is simply lovely. Wandering Son is a series that has come to mean a tremendous amount to me on a very personal level. I am very grateful to Fantagraphics for pursuing the manga in English. Wandering Son is a wonderful story about growing up and personal identity with a very sincere and sensitive look at gender and sexuality. The series started out strong and it continues to be a powerful work. Although reading it can sometimes be traumatic for me because the story touches on issues that hit so close to home, I always look forward to reading the next volume of Wandering Son. I wish I didn’t have to wait for so long between volumes, but it’s always worth it.

With the beginning of seventh grade students are faced with a new school, new teacher, new classmates, and maybe even a few new crushes. In some ways junior high is a chance for a new start, but some problems are carried over from middle school. Shuichi’s close circle of friends has started to fall apart as romantic feelings get in the way and cause a fair amount of tension within the group. The rift between Takatsuki and Chiba has grown particularly wide. It seems as though the two of them may never be able to make up, despite the pain that their falling out has caused for the rest of their friends. Though they are still very close, things have become rather awkward between Shuichi and Takatsuki as well after Shuichi declared having feelings for Takatsuki and Takatsuki gently rejected them. Fortunately, Shuichi has Mako as a source of comfort and reason. It’s a good thing, too, as junior high and puberty have their own challenges; having someone to commiserate with is invaluable. Making new friends doesn’t hurt either, although sometimes that just complicates matters even further.

While the focus of Wandering Son, Volume 5 is still on Shuichi and Takatsuki and their families and friends, it’s interesting to see part of the manga being told from the perspective of their new teacher Manabu Saisho. It actually happens to be his first year teaching. He’s inexperienced and easily flustered, and his eagerness may end up getting him into trouble, but so far I (like Mako) find him charming. But as volatile as junior high and his students can be, I do worry for him a bit. And I worry for Shuichi and the others as well. Adolescence is upon them as are all the changes that entails, most of which cannot be ignored. Mortified after being publicly called out by the basketball coach, Takatsuki is faced with the embarrassing prospect of bra shopping while Shuichi and Mako are trying to come to terms with the fact that their voices will soon be changing. Even seemingly benign statements such as “they’ve grown taller again” are painfully bittersweet reminders of what is in store for them as they continue to physically mature.

Shimura does a fantastic job of layering the textual narrative of Wandering Son with its artwork. The manga’s composition is excellent. There is a particularly effective scene fairly early on in the fifth volume that takes place during the academic year’s opening ceremonies–the commencement speaker expresses the desire for everyone to talk together and encourage one another while the illustration clearly shows that Shuichi and the others can hardly bear to look at one another and that some of them aren’t even on speaking terms. Wandering Son is filled with deceptively simple moments like these in which the artwork and the text express far more together than they ever would alone. Wandering Son is told in such a way that it comes across as a sequence of closely related impressions or vignettes rather than a single, rigidly structured storyline. It’s quite effective in conveying the manga’s more emotive and introspective qualities. I continue to be impressed by Shimura’s work in Wandering Son and look forward to the next volume a great deal.

Attack on Titan, Vol. 8

October 22, 2013 by Sean Gaffney

By Hajime Isayama. Released in Japan by Kodansha, serialization ongoing in the magazine Bessatsu Shonen Magazine. Released in North America by Kodansha Comics.

This review has spoilers for the big reveal that everyone on the internet already knows.

The eighth volume of Attack on Titan begins in a very interesting place, as we start off with a day in the life of Annie and her fellow military police. As you can imagine, they’re just as quirky a squad as our heroes, in their own way, but their bosses are no Erwin Smith – you sense a certain uncaring laziness to them. Annie gets into an interesting philosophical discussion on the nature of idealism and power, and I certainly get her point that at times it can be terrifying to have a true believer in charge of things. All this is upended, however, when she runs into Armin, freshly returned from the outside. Eren is about to be captured/dissected, and he has a plan…

Of course, all this is a ruse, as Armin has merely figured out what the rest of us suspected two volumes ago: Annie is the female titan. From the moment that we saw Eren could become a Titan, we wondered if it was something unique to him (likely due to his father), or if other titans had similar secret identities. There’s a rather amusing joke here where Armin describes the various subtle clues he discovered that led him to think Annie was the culprit, and then Mikasa chimes in “plus they look alike”. (Speaking of Mikasa, there’s an undertone of jealousy in her conversations about Annie I didn’t really like. I know she and Eren are close, but I really don’t want to see their relationship go down a romantic road.)

So there’s a big, city-destroying battle between Eren-Titan and Annie-Titan that ends with Annie encasing herself in amber in order to avoid getting captured and tortured. More importantly, we know certain Titans now have motivation beyond “kill and eat”. Certainly Annie, as a Titan, took delight in killing, particularly with Levi’s team members. But she also seems to have a troubled past with her own father (more similarities to Eren), and a deeper reason exists here. As for everyone else, the rest of the 104th squad are quickly quarantined in case, y’know, Titanism is contagious, but they all seem to be OK.

Then there’s the other big reveal in this episode (which is right about where the anime ended, if you want to start reading from that point on). In the fight with Annie, Mikasa destroyed a chunk of the outer wall. Inside… is a Titan, in suspended animation. A Colossal Titan. The revelation that the walls are full of Titans sort of waiting patiently for something is rather mind-boggling, and I wonder if the obviousness of the Annie reveal was to make this plot twist more impressive. It also finally ties in with the religious leaders who have popped up occasionally throughout this series, and who were clearly aware of the secret of the walls. Bringing devout believers into a series like this is unnerving – on purpose – but not quite as unnerving as seeing the formerly eccentric and happy Hange almost murder a man in cold blood. War does things to people,’s psyches, and war secrets do not help all that much.

The cliffhanger announces that Wall Rose has now been breached by Titans, so I presume Vol. 9 will have a lot more action. There’s many places this story could go from here, a pivotal volume in the series.

(Also, go look for the “Annie Are You OK” video on Youtube, and you will never get Smooth Criminal out of your head while reading this.)

Lonely Hearts Killer

October 18, 2013 by Ash Brown

Author: Tomoyuki Hoshino
Translator: Adrienne Carey Hurley
U.S. publisher: PM Press
ISBN: 9781604860849
Released: November 2009
Original release: 2004

After reading Tomoyuki Hoshino’s collection of short fiction We, the Children of Cats, I knew that I wanted to read more of his work. And so I turned to the novel Lonely Hearts Killer, Hoshino’s first and currently only other volume available in English. Lonely Hearts Killer was originally published in Japan in 2004, making it a later work than most of the stories collected in We, the Children of Cats. Adrienne Carey Hurley’s translation of Lonely Hearts Killer was released in 2009. She initially had a difficult time finding a publisher for the novel. However, like We, the Children of Cats, Lonely Hearts Killer was ultimately released by PM Press under its Found in Translation imprint. Because We, the Children of Cats left such a huge impression on me, I was especially curious to read a long-form work by Hoshino.

When a young and popular emperor unexpectedly dies with only his sister to succeed him, the country is left stunned and directionless. Some people are so affected by his death that they are “spirited away,” a phenomenon which leaves them in a near catatonic state. Shōji Inoue is not one of those people. A young and privileged experimental filmmaker living off his parents, he is fascinated by society’s reaction to the emperor’s death. When he learns that Mikoto, the boyfriend of Iroha–a former classmate, fellow filmmaker, and friend–is among the group of people to have suffered a breakdown, he is intensely curious. But Inoue and Mikoto’s meeting triggers an even greater tragedy and Iroha is left behind to deal with the aftermath. Years later Iroha is working at a remote lodge owned by her friend Mokuren, away from the prying eyes of the mass media which blames her in part for the epidemic of suicides and murders that have swept the country. At the same time, the mass media is one of her only remaining ties to the rest of the world.

Lonely Hearts Killer is told in three parts by three different narrators, each building on and critiquing those that precede them. “The Sea of Tranquility” is seen from Inoue’s perspective, “The Love Suicide Era” is Iroha’s response, and Mokuren’s commentary concludes the novel in “Subida Al Cielo.” Each chapter leads further away from the initial incident in both time and association while simultaneously providing more information about it and capturing the escalation of fear and death. Lonely Hearts Killer is a chronicle of the end of an era; the world is turned upside down and society’s values are inverted. The novel can be both disconcerting and disorienting. People become so consumed by a culture of fear that they come to rely and depend on it. Any challenge to the system is seen as dangerous and the media’s role in its perpetuation is largely ignored by the general population. Things become so twisted around and perverted that it is those who would try to refuse to participate in the violence around them who are deemed abnormal and deviants by society at large.

In addition to the novel itself, the English edition of Lonely Hearts Killer also includes an introduction by the translator and a newly written preface by the author as well as a question and answer session between the two. I found this material to be particularly valuable in putting the work into a greater context. The death of an emperor and the demise of the emperor system is a rare topic in Japanese literature. Lonely Hearts Killer is a very political work although much of its message is left up to the readers’ individual interpretations. The novel has the potential for multiple analyses, including both anarchist and pacifist readings. I personally appreciate this ambiguity; it’s one of the reasons that I find Hoshino’s work as a whole to be so interesting. As I’ve come to expect, Hoshino’s writing requires active engagement and thought on the part of his readers. The novel isn’t particularly easy reading, but the ideas, concepts, and themes that Hoshino deals with in Lonely Hearts Killer are incredibly unsettling, intriguing, and fascinating.

Sherlock Bones, Vol. 1

October 17, 2013 by Sean Gaffney

By Yuma Ando and Yuki Sato. Released in Japan as “Tanteiken Sherdock” by Kodansha, serialized in the magazine Weekly Shonen Magazine. Released in North America by Kodansha Comics.

It’s a rather odd time here in North America, where we have had a series of Sherlock Holmes adaptations of various stripes over the last couple of years. JManga had a Holmes volume up that was sort of supernatural horror with bishonen Holmes. Young Miss Holmes pays close attention to the canon even as it welds in a precocious niece. And now we have Sherlock Bones, where Sherlock is reincarnated as a dog in modern-day Japan, and fights crime with the help of a young boy who gets to be his Doctor Watson. As you can imagine, this one is geared more towards younger readers, but certainly it’s not juvenile. We’re dealing with murders here.

The author is used to this type of detective mystery, of course, being the creator of Kindaichi Case Files under another pseudonym. The story is the important thing here, and Sherlock’s presence is merely a vehicle for it (as well as for a few weak “Sherlock is a dog now” jokes). Unlike Young Miss Holmes, so far the creators seems to have very little use for the Watson canon, only using the broadest strokes such as Sherlock’s pipe. As for Watson, or rather Takeru Wajima, he’s a typical shonen protagonist, bieng fairly normal but with a stubborn stick-to-it-ivness that will serve him well in dealing with Sherlock’s whims.

The book starts us off with a fairly easy attempted murder where the clues are all laid out in the open, before moving on to the main story involving a crime where the murderer is fairly obvious, but we have to figure out motive, means, etc. Indeed, motive proves to be the key here, as we learn that the culprit isn’t just evil like that but has a deeply tragic reason for committing the crime. It helps that the victim isn’t that nice a kid – but he’s still a KID, so there’s not that much sympathy.

This runs in Shonen Magazine, so the mysteries aren’t meant to be all that hard to solve, and you can usually come up with the solution at the same time as Sherlock does. Of course, since it does run in Shonen Magazine, there’s also a bit of fanservice focus on boobs ‘n butts, though certainly less than you’d see in Fairy Tail or Negima. In the end, this is a mystery anthology series along the lines of Case Closed or Kindaichi, with “Sherlock Holmes is a dog” as the gimmick. We do see a girl who’s meant to be a love interest of some sort, though given the nature of the series she could easily be killed off in Volume 2 for all I know. But for the most part I expect this to be episodic, which makes it a good series to dip in and out of without worrying too much about missing anything. It’s cute and fun, if not all that gripping.

Blade of the Immortal, Vol. 26: Blizzard

October 16, 2013 by Ash Brown

Creator: Hiroaki Samura
U.S. publisher: Dark Horse
ISBN: 9781616550981
Released: March 2013
Original release: 2009
Awards: Eisner Award, Japan Media Arts Award

Blizzard is the twenty-sixth volume in the English-language edition of Hiroaki Samura’s long-running, award-winning manga series Blade of the Immortal. Dark Horse originally released Blade of the Immortal by story arc rather than by number of chapters, so the volumes in the English-language release are slightly different from those in the original Japanese edition. Blizzard was published by Dark Horse in 2013 and is equivalent to the twenty-fifth volume of the Japanese series which was released in 2009. Blizzard takes place during the final major story arc of Blade of the Immortal and includes one of the series’ most important climaxes. I consider Blizzard to be a companion volume to the previous collection Snowfall at Dawn which leaves off partway through the battle between Shira and Manji. By the end of Snowfall at Dawn things aren’t looking at all good for Rin and Manji, so I was anxious to read Blizzard.

With Manji and Rin sunk beneath the pond’s freezing surface, Shira returns to the roadside where he left Magatsu incapacitated. Shira is not yet through with Manji, but he wants revenge against the young Ittō-ryū fighter as well and intends on making the most of their chance meeting. Magatsu is surprised to see Shira, too, having previously sent the sadistic killer plummeting from the top of a cliff during their last encounter. Shira once again finds himself interrupted when he is challenged by Meguro, one of Habaki’s shinobi. She has little hope of defeating Shira, especially now that he is semi-immortal, but her attack serves as a distraction. Shira isn’t aware of it, but back at the pond Meguro’s companion Tanpopo is doing all that she can to rescue and revive both Rin and Manji. At this point Manji is the only person who has even a slight chance of stopping Shira, but as Manji’s condition continues to deteriorate his success seems increasingly unlikely.

The beginning of Manji and Shira’s confrontation in Snowfall at Dawn was relatively subdued, focusing more on the psychological aspects of Shira’s attack and less on the physical combat. The conclusion of their battle in Blizzard is what I was really expecting and waiting for from their showdown. With two near immortals battling it out the damage that they inflict on each other is tremendous. Others can only look on astounded at the viciousness and brutality of the bloodbath occurring in front of them. Describing Manji and Shira’s final fight as intense would be putting it very mildly. At times it is difficult to see through all of the blood and guts as the two opponents literally rip each other apart. Samura’s artwork is unflinching and captures the entirety of their exceptionally violent battle as well as its bloody aftermath. Blizzard is extreme and gruesome and even those who make it through to the end of the volume barely survive.

While the duel between Shira and Manji is certainly the focus of Blizzard it isn’t the only important development in Blade of the Immortal to occur in the volume. I was happy to see Tanpopo and Meguro take on a more active role in the series. Up until this point in the manga they have generally been part of the series’ comedic relief–Meguro in particular frequently comes across as rather ditsy–but the women are shown to be quite capable martially in Blizzard. Another important development in the volume has to do with Renzō. His father, a member of the Ittō-ryū, was killed fairly early on by Manji in Blade of the Immortal. Since then Renzō has led a very difficult life, eventually becoming a broken and damaged young man partly due to the abuse he suffered at Shira’s hands and partly because he can’t forgive what happened to his father. His struggle isn’t over, but his story does begin to find a satisfying resolution in Blizzard.

No Matter How I Look At It, It’s You Guys’ Fault I’m Not Popular!, Vol. 1

October 15, 2013 by Sean Gaffney

By Nico Tanigawa. Released in Japan as “Watashi ga Motenai no wa dō Kangaetemo Omaera ga Warui!” by Square Enix, serialized on the website Gangan Comics Online. Released in North America by Yen Press.

Despite a title longer than your arm, this new manga series is not, in fact, based on a light novel. It’s usually shortened to “WataMote” in fan discussions – indeed, I’ve used that tag for my Category on this review, rather than screw up the sidebar. Still, with a title like that, if you’re someone who’s been a fan of anime over the past few years, it comes with certain expectations even before you read it. High school slice-of-life, comedic misunderstandings, discussion of otaku interests. And indeed, all that is true. But it’s the heroine who drives this title, and Tomoko Kuroki is not going to simply lie back and be cute and moe.

Tomoko gives new meaning to the term “socially awkward”. In her head, she’s got it all down – she’s starting high school, will make new friends, get a boyfriend, and her life will be wonderful. In reality, not only is she a cripplingly shy girl who can barely manage the most basic interaction, but she’s not even cute and adorable like most manga heroines with those issues. Tomoko can be hard to like. She emotionally manipulates her brother, is crass and opportunistic, and has an inability to see even basic human interaction and understand what it means.

Notably, she’s not bullied or picked on at all by any of her peers – they mostly just ignore her, but it’s not in a ‘she’s creepy’ way, she simply rarely registers on their radar. When occasional peers do speak to her, it tends to be friendly, and mostly the only time they rear back in awkward horror is when she says or does something incredibly inappropriate. Honestly, that’s a little unrealistic, but the mangaka doesn’t really want to go in a bullying direction here – Tomoko makes her own problems. We can’t even blame a poor family life – her mother and brother seem to be perfectly fine with social interaction, though her brother regards her as incredibly annoying and exhausting. And, well, he’s correct.

An anime adaptation of this aired over the summer, and many people kept asking themselves whether the intention of the work was to laugh at Tomoko’s foibles, feel pity for her attempts to bond with life and other people, or just feel incredibly uncomfortable at watching her existence? The answer, of course, is all three. We don’t want to be seen to laugh at someone like Tomoko, but honestly, some of the behavior here is pretty hilarious, and her snark is also pointed and amusing. That said, there aren’t real punchlines here, just a setup that goes off the rails. Instead of a punchline, we see Tomoko sitting on a park swing, looking miserable, as her brother silently stares at her. Or in a bathroom, ripping a pair of panties to shreds in a terror-stricken bout of mortification.

This manga seems to push against its own audience, which is otaku-oriented males. At one point, Tomoko talks to her one friend (who I hope we see more of), and is asked about the new anime season. Tomoko blithely responds that it’s all moeblob shows this year. This may be slice-of-life, but it’s no K-On! I do want to read more, but I am very grateful that it’s only coming out here every three months, as Tomoko is as exhausting and frustrating to read as she must be to live with. Definitely recommended, but be aware that this title pulls in several different directions at once, and deliberately doesn’t resolve any of them.

A Dark Fable of the Forest, Vols. 1 and 2

October 14, 2013 by Anna N

A Dark Fable of the Forest Volumes 1 and 2 by Yuriko Matsukawa

As I started reading A Dark Fable of the Forest I thought that the art style looked pleasingly familiar, and then I remembered that I’d previously read Matsukawa’s other books published on emanga.com, Late Advent and two collections of short stories. While I enjoyed her other books, I think A Dark Fable of the Forest is my current favorite manga by this author, simply because there are some enjoyably gothic elements in the book that are getting me in the Halloween mood.

Dark Fable of the Forest Vol. 1 is available on emanga.com

Alyssa is a student who works at a reporting agency that specializes in paranormal and unexplained happenings. As she’s hunting down a myth about a particular type of rare bird that lives in a forest in Austria where young children frequently disappear, a strange brooding man dressed all in black seems to observe her. Black birds and dark feathers are interspersed with panels showing Alyssa’s investigations, creating a bit of a foreboding air. Alyssa and her companion are rescued by the mysterious stranger, who remains silent as he hosts them in his house, taking time out now and then to brush the hair of an elaborate porcelain doll. Alyssa is determined to investigate the silently mysterious Chevalier Bayard Gran d’Or, but there are events happening in the forest that are being caused more by human greed than the supernatural.

As the story progresses, Alyssa begins to learn more about her mysterious protector as she continues with her investigations into other unexplained phenomena. The porcelain doll ends up actually being a sentient being named Pineau Rouge, but it is amusingly over the top to see the brooding Chevalier carrying around what looks like a miniaturized Victorian girl who has no problem expressing herself.

A Dark Fable of the Forest Vol. 2 is available on emanga.com

The series settles into a well-executed monster of the week manga, as the Chevalier keeps popping up just when Alyssa needs him if she’s investigating murderous plants, unexplained appearances of saints on castle walls, or issues with her own relatives. The episodic nature of the manga is nicely balanced by the developing relationship between Alyssa and the Chevalier, and the suggestion that they may share a connection other than happening to be in the same place at the same time far too often for coincidence. Matsukawa’s illustrations are detailed and attractive, and the Chevalier has enough bird like characteristics in his character design to seem quite otherworldly. Alyssa actually becomes the very type of thing that she’s investigating towards the end of this series, as the monster of the week type story ends up morphing into a climatic battle between good and evil. The ending felt a bit rushed, but that’s often the case with two volume series. Still, I enjoy reading the occasional shorter series like this just because it is nice to be able to read a complete series in a couple days. This is a fun manga to read in October, as the gothic elements are both amusing and creepy. I’m glad to see emanga continuing to translate the occasional shoujo title, as it is nice to be able to stumble across a more quirky story like A Dark Fable of the Forest.

The Shogun’s Daughter

October 11, 2013 by Ash Brown

Author: Laura Joh Rowland
Publisher: St. Martin’s Press
ISBN: 9781250028617
Released: September 2013

The Shogun’s Daughter is the seventeenth volume in Laura Joh Rowland’s mystery series set in Tokugawa-era Japan and featuring Sano Ichirō as a main protagonist. Despite my interest in Japanese history and my enjoyment of mystery and crime fiction, somehow it wasn’t until I received The Shogun’s Daughter through LibraryThing’s Early Reviewers program that I became aware of Rowland’s Sano Ichirō novels. The series made its debut in 1994 with the novel Shinjū. Over the years, a few of the individual volumes in the series have been nominated for major genre awards for mystery and crime fiction. The Shogun’s Daughter was released in 2013 by the mystery and suspense imprint of St. Martin’s Press, Minotaur Books. (Minotaur also happens to be the publisher for Keigo Higashino’s Detective Galileo series in English, which I enjoy.) Even though I hadn’t previously read any of Rowland’s Sano Ichirō mysteries, I was still looking forward to reading The Shogun’s Daughter and giving the series a try.

In late 1703, a massive earthquake and accompanying tsunami devastated Edo, killing thousands of people. A few months later another death would also have a tremendous impact on the city. Tsuruhime, Shogun Tokugawa Tsunayoshi’s only child, dies of smallpox. However, some members of the government are convinced that her death wasn’t entirely natural. With Tsuruhime’s passing, the shogunate’s chain of succession has become even more precarious. The Shogun finally feels compelled to name his heir–Yoshisato, a young man claiming to be his long-lost son although many suspect that he’s actually the son of the official Yanagisawa Yoshiyasu. Yanagisawa is now in a position to control the shogunate through Yoshisato and it doesn’t take long for him to purge the government of those who would stand against him. Among them is Sano Ichirō, who once served as the Shogun’s right-hand man. But if Sano can prove that Yanagisawa is somehow connected to Tsuruhime’s death, he stands a chance of regaining his status and revealing Yanagisawa’s plot for power.

As Rowland has sixteen novels worth of material to cover, the beginning of The Shogun’s Daughter is understandably a little slow going. Those who have never read a Sano Ichirō mystery will be at a slight disadvantage, but the most critical points of the characters and their backstories are quickly established. It’s obvious that they all have quite a history with one another, though, particularly Yanagisawa and Sano with their ongoing rivalry. Occasionally an unclear reference is made to something that occurred earlier in the series, but generally The Shogun’s Daughter stands reasonably well on its own. The only major exception to this is the side-plot dealing with Hirata, one of Sano’s chief retainers, which feels terribly out-of-place with the rest of the novel. It contains the only supernatural elements to be found in The Shogun’s Daughter–Hirata is practitioner of the “mystical martial arts”–and has no direct impact on the main story. It seems to be a plot line carried over from the previous novels, and it leads into the next, but in The Shogun’s Daughter it mostly serves as an unwanted distraction.

It may take The Shogun’s Daughter some time to find its flow, but once it does the novel and mystery move along at a fairly rapid pace. Sano isn’t the only one who is involved with the investigation into Tsuruhime’s death–his wife, son, and even Hirata’s young daughter all help, making it something of a family affair. Their logic is a little shaky in places, but this can usually be explained by the younger characters’ inexperience, the stress of the situation as a whole, and government intrigue and political maneuverings. What I appreciated the most about The Shogun’s Daughter is how Rowland has used historical figures and events as a framework to craft her story. Sano and his family may be fictional, but many of the people they deal with, including Yanagisawa, are not. The natural disasters and recovery efforts as well as the trouble with the Tokugawa succession are all based on actual events. Unfortunately, the dialogue and some of the terminology used feels too modern and would throw me out of the setting. Otherwise, the time period is nicely established and Rowland quite cleverly weaves her characters and mystery into Japan’s history.

Thank you to St. Martin’s Press for providing a copy of The Shogun’s Daughter for review.

Vinland Saga, Vol. 1

October 9, 2013 by Ash Brown

Creator: Makoto Yukimura
U.S. publisher: Kodansha
ISBN: 9781612624204
Released: October 2013
Original release: 2005
Awards: Japan Media Arts Award, Kodansha Manga Award

Makoto Yukimura’s Vinland Saga is a manga series that I have been hoping would be licensed in English for years. Understandably, I was thrilled when Kodansha Comics announced that it would be publishing the series. Not only that, Vinland Saga is Kodansha’s first foray into deluxe, hardcover manga. Kodansha’s edition of Vinland Saga uses a larger trim size than its other manga, contains color pages, and is being released in an omnibus format. The first volume of Kodansha’s Vinland Saga, published in 2013, collects the first two volumes in the original Japanese edition of the series, both of which were released in 2005. Vinland Saga is a critically acclaimed, award-winning manga. In 2009, Yukimura earned a Japan Media Arts award for the series. Even more recently, Vinland Saga won a Kodansha Manga Award in 2012. Even if Vinland Saga wasn’t already so well received, I would still want to read it. Yukimura is a the creator of Planetes, which I love, and I also happen to have a particular interest in Iceland among other things.

When he was only six years old, Thorfinn’s father was killed before his very eyes. Thors was a great man and a great warrior, but that was a life he tried to leave behind in order to live with his family in peace in a small Icelandic village. Thors’ past is inescapable and ultimately leads to his death, but in the process he is able to protect what is most dear to him. Even at such a young age Thorfinn vows to avenge his father. Ten years later he has grown into a hostile and stubborn young fighter serving under the very man who was responsible for his father’s death. Askeladd is a shrewd and cunning leader, his band of mercenaries willing to take on any job for the right price. Their battle prowess is fearsome, relying not only on their sheer strength and power but on underhanded strategies and their willingness to be utterly ruthless. Askeladd and his men may be uncouth, but they are also a terrible force to be reckoned with.

Vinland Saga is historical fiction and the series is inspired by actual events and people as well as by Norse sagas. The great adventurer Leif Ericson plays a significant role in the first omnibus of Vinland Saga and Thorfinn himself is loosely based on another explorer–Thorfinn Karlsefni. Considering that the manga deals with eleventh-century warfare and Vikings, a northern Germanic group of seafarers notorious for raiding and pillaging, it’s probably not too surprising that Vinland Saga can be rather violent. The battles in Vinland Saga are particularly well done. Some of the physical feats may be astounding or even slightly exaggerated–there are some very good reasons that Askeladd’s mercenaries are so feared–but the flow of the battles are very realistic as are the resulting deaths and injuries. Yukimura hasn’t forgotten the use and limitations of technology and tactics in Vinland Saga and they are appropriate for the era being portrayed. In general Yukimura’s action sequences are very exciting and leave quite an impression.

Vikings are often depicted as savage, bloodthirsty invaders in fiction but this portrayal misses some of the nuances and complexities of the historical reality. Yukimura notes in the afterword of the first volume of Vinland Saga that he wanted to show more than just a stereotypical representation of Vikings in his story. I think he is very successful in that. Much of Vinland Saga, Omnibus 1 focuses on brutal skirmishes, battles, and duels, but the development of Thorfinn and his family–particularly his father, but his mother and sister, too–as well as their Icelandic village and the other people who live there is also very important. The exceptional events surrounding the outbreak of war may be some of the major driving forces behind the story but the more mundane affairs of everyday life, such as the concerns over the changing weather and the coming winter and disputes over land for grazing, provide additional depth and realism to the series. I thoroughly enjoyed the first Vinland Saga omnibus and am looking forward to the release of the second.

Otome Games Review: Kiss of Revenge and Be My Princess

October 6, 2013 by Anna N

Kiss of Revenge

Kiss of Revenge is available on the iphone and on android.

This is another Voltage game like Pirates in Love which I reviewed previously. I’ve decided after playing this game that there was not nearly enough kissing or revenge, so the title was a bit misleading. Also, while the story is certainly going to appeal to fans of melodrama, I found the hospital setting to be not very interesting in the absence of pirates or ninjas. Perhaps I would have enjoyed this game more if it was a ninja hospital.

The storyline focuses on a young doctor who is determined to get her REVENGE after her mother was killed in a botched operation many years ago. She went to medical school and selected the hospital that was the site of her mother’s death in order to expose injustice and coldly execute her revenge. Unfortunately she is surrounded by a variety of handsome co-workers.

The current director of the hospital was the surgeon who botched the operation many years ago, so one easy course for revenge on the part of the heroine is to target his son.

Although she is occasionally distracted by the presence of her childhood friend, who just happens to have a salesman job pushing medical supplies.

While there are plenty of dramatic descriptions of close calls digging up ancient medical files and surgical preparations, I found the real world setting of this game to be a bit humdrum. Also, I was expecting more revengy antics earlier in the game but there’s more of a slow build to all of the emotional trauma that occurs in the later episodes. There’s also a narrative device that is interesting due to the branching storylines, but at the same time a bit annoying because it represents another set of episodes that has to be paid for. At one point in the story the heroine is prompted to chose revenge or give it up, and if you want to play the non-revenge ending (who wouldn’t choose revenge!) you have to buy those separate episodes.

The other thing that I found less than interesting about this game is that while there are other characters to play, clearly the one where the heroine concentrates on the son of the evil hospital director is going to be the most interesting one. I wasn’t all that invested in finding out what the story variations would be if I picked a different character. Overall, this game didn’t really capture my interest. The storyline also ensured that there wouldn’t be as much humor, and I wasn’t very entertained. If you enjoy more melodramatic stories with real world elements though, this might appeal to you.

Be My Princess

Be My Princess is available for itunes and android

This is a game that is actually fairly easy to play without spending any money on it, and after an attempt to buy game credit that didn’t show up in my account, I would really recommended that people do not even attempt to spend money on this game.

Be My Princess is the story of a young fashion designer who ends up in a tiny imaginary European country that seems to be bursting at the seams with princes! They all seem to be strangely attracted to her! They are also somewhat bland and fairly interchangeable, but their prince outfits have a hilarious amount of ruffles.

The storylines so far in this game are really not that interesting. So far I’ve played through three endings of a special event storyline, where the heroine runs off with a prince, and in each variation Their Love is not accepted so there’s an elopement scandal but it all works out in the end.

The virtual paper doll aspects of the game are probably the most entertaining aspect of it all. Here’s a screenshot of my character.

And her extremely cluttered room.

If you play this game you get five passes to read further along in each chapter that reset every morning. There are often checkpoints where you have to swap out your clothes for more elaborate clothes, and have to exchange your free virtual game money for a new handbag or dress. If you do not spend money on the game your closet and furniture storage is limited, thus you are Less Charming. I haven’t found this to be a tremendous hardship so far, although it sometimes led my character to have incredibly wacky outfits as she went through checkpoints. Overall, this game was fairly bland, and I wasn’t happy about the snafu that denied me the opportunity to buy more closet space. At the same time, it does seem to be ideally set up for very casual gaming. The plot might not be all that interesting, but it is entertaining enough to login for 10 minutes a day or so and progress through the princess rankings system.

Here are some random out of context screenshots from Pirates in Love, which I continued to play after my initial review.

Up next: the very entertaining Love Letter from Thief X, which is probably my favorite game so far.

Tropic of the Sea

October 5, 2013 by Ash Brown

Creator: Satoshi Kon
U.S. publisher: Vertical
ISBN: 9781939130068
Released: September 2013
Original release: 1990

Satoshi Kon is probably best known as a phenomenal writer and director of anime, especially in the West, but he started his career working in manga. Tropic of the Sea, serialized in Young Magazine in 1990, was Kon’s first long-form manga. Vertical’s release of the English-language edition of Tropic of the Sea in 2013 marks the first, and hopefully not the last, of Kon’s manga to be translated into the language. The volume also includes an afterword by Kon excerpted from the ninth anniversary edition of Tropic of the Sea published in Japan in 1999. Vertical’s edition of Tropic of the Sea is actually based on an even later Japanese release of the manga from 2011. Already a fan of Kon’s work in anime, I was thrilled when Tropic of the Sea was licensed. I was even more excited for the manga’s release when I saw the absolutely gorgeous and captivating cover. Added to that the manga’s focus on legends and the sea and I was sold.

For generations, the small fishing village of Ade has been blessed by calm seas and bountiful catches. This good fortune has been attributed to a promise made between a mermaid and a priest–the village receives protection and in return he will worship the sea and care for the mermaid’s egg for sixty years before returning it to begin the cycle anew. But times are changing and very few people believe the old legend to actually be true. Yosuke Yashiro’s family is responsible for guarding the egg and its shrine, but his father does the unthinkable and reveals the secret of its existence to the world. The sacred relic has now become a draw for tourists, only the most recent example of the increased commercialization of Ade. Although there have been some good things to come from the village’s development, many people are upset with the extent of the changes that have been made and what they may be losing in exchange.

At first the pacing of Tropic of the Sea is fairly leisurely, appropriate for a story that takes place in a quiet seaside village, but as the manga progresses the pace steadily quickens. The role that Ozaki, Ade’s most prominent commercial developer, plays as the manga’s villain is somewhat predictable–desiring the mermaid’s egg for his own purposes while claiming to be interested in the good of humanity–but he does have slightly more to him than first appears. One of the greatest things about Tropic of the Sea from beginning to end is Kon’s artwork. A tremendous amount of attention has been give to the backgrounds and landscapes, granting the manga a very real sense of place which is crucial for the story. The illustrations also convey a feeling of mystery and wonder, awe and foreboding, surrounding the mermaids and the sea. Some of the scenes involving water are simply stunning, the realism strikingly rendered. The artwork in Tropic of the Sea is wonderful.

What impressed me the most about Tropic of the Sea, though, is how subtly complex and deceptively simple the narrative is for such a short work. Thematically, Tropic of the Sea has many overlapping layers and the story can be viewed through a number of different lenses. Tropic of the Sea explores generational dissonance, familial disputes, the values of modernity and tradition, the tension between science and religion and skepticism and belief, the human struggle both with and against nature, the power of legends and their impact on reality. (And that’s just to name a few of the many elements in play.) Any of these aspects of Tropic of the Sea can be focused on individually but they are all interconnected and influence one another to form an engaging story with a surprising amount of depth. Out of the various conflicts portrayed, no one side is ever entirely in the right. I enjoyed Tropic of the Sea a great deal. It may be an earlier work, but Kon’s talent was already evident.

Mobile Suit Gundam: The Origin, Vol. 3

October 5, 2013 by Sean Gaffney

By Yoshikazu Yasuhiko; Original Story by Yoshiyuki Tomino and Hajime Yatate; Mechanical Design by Kunio Okawara. Released in Japan by Kadokawa Shoten, serialized in the magazine Gundam Ace. Released in North America by Vertical, Inc.

In the first 2 volumes of this Gundam manga it’s been fairly easy to root for our heroes. They’re fighting against an empire with fascist tendencies, and the two main antagonists we’ve gotten so far are a smug schemer and a daddy’s boy who looks to be in over his head and is dispatched fairly easily at the end of the last volume. Char will no doubt continue to be a headache, but Garma is no more. Of course, this means we need a new minor villain, and it’s not going to be Char, as he’s too busy smirking. And so we get to the title character of this book, Ramba Ral.

Make no mistake about it, Ramba Ral is exactly what this book needed at this point. Even if Char is a very popular character with fans, the fact is that the heroes and villains have been more black and white than they needed to be. This is particularly evident at Garma’s state funeral, which Gihren quickly starts using as a political rally to mobilize the troops. This, combined with the funeral choreography and the uniformed fascism, makes the Principality of Zeon look like Nazi and the Naztones to a degree. Ramba Ral is different, and reminds you that this isn’t “fighting aliens” – all of these people are ultimately human beings with human flaws and human virtues. He’s a captain who loves him men, loves to fight, and is very good at it. His wife is second in command and clearly much of the brains behind the operation. It’s a shame that the plot decrees his fate at the end of this book, as I’d much rather he have been the main antagonist.

And counterbalancing Ramba Ral being a villain who is easy to respect and admire, our heroes are having a very rough time of it. Amuro has always been a petulant teenager, but here his temper tantrums get dealt with in detail, and he runs away. Bright, meanwhile, is doing his best to try and think like a commander, but making decisions that are the right thing to do is proving to be unpopular… not only with his men, but with Mirai. As for Sayla, she’s finding that being a double agent is a lot harder than it looks, particularly when you’re not working for the villains. All three of these characters make somewhat dumb decisions, pay for them, and later learn to read people’s hearts to see what the better option is.

There’s still lots of what makes everyone love Gundam in the first place. The battles are taking up more and more space in the book, but are still very exciting. And the political back and forth and constant attempts to get the upper hand is even better. Char excels at this, of course, even when captured for insubordination. He’s just a man who wants his sunglasses. That’s all. Add in an afterward by Shimoku Kio, who draws the female cast, and has the Genshiken meet Amuro, and you have absolutely no reason not to pick this up. An excelletn volume.

Sickness Unto Death, Vol. 1

October 2, 2013 by Sean Gaffney

By Hikaru Asada and Takahiro Seguchi. Released in Japan as “Shi ni Itaru Yamai” by Hakusensha, serialized in the magazine Young Animal. Released in North America by Vertical.

This manga starts in right away telling you that it’s going to be a tragedy. The very first scene shows us our hero, as an adult, visiting the grave of the heroine. It’s very stark, especially considering how much emphasis the rest of the text puts on trying to save her from her inner demons and her despair. But given how the efforts to save her are, much of the time, exactly the wrong thing to do (or being handled by the wrong person), it shouldn’t come as too much of a surprise. This isn’t a romantic comedy, it’s ‘watching a car crash in slow motion’ manga. Still, that can be riveting, and it in here.

We get most of the story, as I said, in flashback. Kazuma, a young man going to college so he can study psychology, answers an ad providing lodging for him if he could care for a sick person. Said person is Emiru, an emaciated young woman whose hair has turned white and who seems to exist in a perpetual state of “almost dying” without actually doing so. Kazuma is immediately attracted to her, and decides that he’s going to try his best to get her out of this gloom that her life has become. As I noted above, this is a giant mistake. Emiru’s butler, who should step in as a mature adult and say this, doesn’t say anything as he’s beholden to the family, and also gets conveniently written out. Kazuma’s teacher helps him understand the psychological aspects of Emiru’s mindset, but thinks he’s speaking in the abstract. And then things get more intimate…

I’ll be honest with you, it’s hard for me to read this work without thinking of another manga that revolves, supposedly, around despair. It doesn’t help that as an adult, Kazuma bears a distinct resemblance to Itoshiki-sensei, the lead teacher in Sayonara Zetsubou-sensei, and that manga too has him dealing with young women with psychological problems. This is an altogether darker work, though, and where it best succeeds is focusing on Emiru’s all-encompassing pain and despondency. It doesn’t help that we see flashbacks to her about two years ago, and she’s a cute, outgoing young high school student – the sort of girl who would be the love interest in some shonen harem manga. Now her hair has turned white, she’s so thin you can almost see through her, and she lives on the verge of despair. Of course, this is a two-volume series, so we don’t actually find out her tragic past till next volume, but I can hazard a few guesses…

I greatly enjoyed this volume, but I have to admit that a lot of the time I was screaming at Kazuma “No, no, don’t do that, argh, are you stupid?!” But hey, he’s a young smitten teenager who’s fallen for someone who seems to be drifting away from him even as he meets her. It’s no wonder he’s so desperate. And so here, in this volume, we have the Sickness. I can only presume Volume Two will bring the Death. It looks to be riveting.

Vinland Saga, Vol. 1

September 29, 2013 by Sean Gaffney

By Makoto Yukimura. Released in Japan as two separate volumes by Kodansha, serialized in the magazines Weekly Shonen Magazine, then Afternoon. Released in North America by Kodansha Comics.

At last, after years of fans begging for a license, we have one of the most anticipated titles of the year. Makoto Yukimura was released over here previously with his sci-fi garbage scow series Planetes, but that was another “critically acclaimed poor seller” that fans love and publishers hate. Nevertheless, the author’s skill is demonstrable in that series, and his art and storytelling have only improved since then. This tale of Thorfinn, a reluctant Viking warrior/prisoner-of-war and his tragic backstory is absolutely riveting, and makes you yearn for the next book in the series to come out so you can read on. Honestly, if it weren’t already in an omnibus (a handsome, hardcover one, by the way, looking very nice), I’d feel even more impatient.

We open with Thorfinn already a young adult, then flash back to tell his backstory. This helps to amp up the tragedy as we can see what a cold-blooded killer Thorfinn can be… and how he pales in comparison to the captain who controls him, Askeladd. For all that this series may be Thorfinn’s, Askeladd is the one who captures the reader’s attention right off the bat, and I suspect he won any reader polls Japan had. Cheerful, clever, sly, and ruthless all in one, Askeladd makes a great anti-hero to contrast with Thorfinn’s sullen warrior. He even has his own moral code, such as it is – one we see in the second half of the book, when we find out just how Thorfinn lost his father Thors and was captured.

By the way, for those who love Berserk, you’ll love this too. It’s not QUITE as bleak and ultraviolent – at least not in this first volume – but there’s a lot of the same feel, and the battle scenes are fantastic (despite the presence of one of the worst Star Wars jokes I’ve ever seen). The art isn’t only good in the battle scenes either – the author has taken great care to be as historically accurate as possible in a fictional manga world, and I loved the attention to detail we see here.

I was expecting this to be a totally male-dominated book – and honestly, it still may end up that way – but there are two very good female roles here. First of all, the book’s only light relief is provided by Thorfinn’s older sister Ylva, a tsundere trapped in 11th century Iceland, who has all the boys of the village falling at her feet but would much rather stomp around and be grumpy. As for Thorfinn’s mother, she mostly exists on the sideline supporting her husband… till we see a flashback to Ylva’s birth, where Thors is prepared to simply nod and leave, and his wife looks like she’ll leap out of the bed and throttle him unless he names their child. The manga is filled with little moments like this.

This is not going to be a cheery romp – expect the majority of the cast to die – but it’s gripping stuff, and incredibly hard to put down. I really enjoyed Planetes, but you can see how Yukimura has evolved further here. The story carries you along effortlessly, makes you care about these people even as it then hurts them horribly, and is simply filled with badass men being badass. It was worth the long wait to get this.

The Edogawa Rampo Reader

September 29, 2013 by Ash Brown

Author: Edogawa Rampo
Translator: Seth Jacobowitz
U.S. publisher: Kurodahan Press
ISBN: 9784902075250
Released: December 2008
Original release: 1926-1956

The Edogawa Rampo Reader, edited and translated by Seth Jacobowitz, was only the third volume of Edogawa Rampo’s work to be released in English, following Japanese Tales of Mystery and Imagination (which I have read and thoroughly enjoyed) and The Black Lizard and The Beast in the Shadows. Published by Kurodahan Press in 2008, The Edogawa Rampo Reader collects eight of Rampo’s short stories and ten of his essays selected from 1926 through 1956. In addition to these eighteen selections, The Edogawa Rampo Reader also includes a preface by Tatsumi Takayuki and an extensive introduction by Jacobowitz. Prior to the release of The Edogawa Rampo Reader, none of Rampo’s nonfiction work had been translated into English. In fact, all of the selections in The Edogawa Rampo Reader made their first appearance in English in the volume.

After the preface and introduction, The Edogawa Rampo Reader is divided into two sections: The Stories and The Essays. The stories include “The Daydream,” “The Martian Canals,” “The Appearance of Osei,” “Poison Weeds,” “The Stalker in the Attic,” “The Air Raid Shelter,” “Doctor Mera’s Mysterious Crimes,” and “The Dancing Dwarf.” Selected from throughout his career, the works exhibit Rampo’s skills as a mystery writer as well as a writer of the strange. The essays primarily fall into two different categories, those that are at least somewhat autobiographical–“The Horrors of Film,” “Spectral Voices,” “A Passion for Lenses,” “The Phantom Lord,” “My Love for the Printed Word,” and “Confessions of Rampo”–and those that deal with mystery fiction–“Fingerprint Novels of the Meiji Era,” “Dickens vs. Poe,” “An Eccentric Idea,” and “A Desire for Transformation.” Although there are more essays than stories in The Edogawa Rampo Reader, the nonfiction selections tend to be shorter than the fiction and so the section isn’t quite as long.

Whereas Japanese Tales of Mystery and Imagination basically amounted to a “best of” collection of Rampo’s short stories, The Edogawa Rampo Reader was deliberately curated to be representative of the different stages in Rampo’s career. Additionally, the volume emphasizes recurring motifs and themes that Rampo was fond of incorporating into both his fiction and nonfiction. The Edogawa Rampo Reader is meant to be comprehensive, single-volume exploration of Rampo and his work. As much as I enjoy Rampo’s short stories (which I do quite a bit) the real draw of The Edogawa Rampo Reader for me was the essays. Rampo is not only a fascinating author, he is also a fascinating person. His love of reading and writing comes through very clearly in his nonfiction. It was also interesting to see where he found his inspiration as a writer. His own life and imagination were sources, but literature from Japan and the rest of the world were also important influences.

The Edogawa Rampo Reader is a valuable resource. Rampo is an important literary figure in Japan, often cited as the father of modern Japanese mystery and crime fiction. His influence can still be seen today. Rampo is a noteworthy and intriguing creator; it really is a shame that more of his work isn’t available in English. Although they are all very good, I didn’t find the short stories in The Edogawa Rampo Reader to be quite as immediately engaging as those in Japanese Tales of Mystery and Imagination. However, overall the selection is broader in terms of genre and style. My favorite story was probably “The Stalker in the Attic,” which features Rampo’s detective Akechi Kogorō. (I would love to see an entire collection of Akechi stories in English.) But, as already mentioned, Rampo’s essays are really the highlight of the volume. I hope to see more of Rampo’s work released in English, but The Edogawa Rampo Reader makes a fine introduction to the influential author’s life and writing.