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Reviews

The Palette of 12 Secret Colors 3 by Nari Kusakawa: B

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From the back cover:
Cello meets Fenne, a fellow Palette-in-training who’s been having problems with his abilities ever since his bird-partner died. Despite his sarcastic attitude, Cello is determined to both help him find a suitable new bird and to become his friend. Then Olga—Dr. Guell’s jealous bird—decides that Cello is taking up way too much of Dr. Guell’s time. So now she’s determined to make sure that Cello quickly completes her Palette training.

Review:
Just as I was wishing to know more about Cello’s progress, she makes a remark in one chapter about how she has cleared “about half” of the first twelve colors. That’s a step in the right direction, I suppose.

Unfortunately, none of the stories in this volume really do much for me, though none is bad or anything. A new character, Fenne, is introduced and ropes Cello into helping him adapt one of the migratory birds that visit the island to be his new partner. At first he mocks her for having to repeat her first year, but comes to like her, which bothers Dr. Guell, who is coming to realize that Cello occupies his thoughts rather a lot.

The story with Olga serving as Cello’s tutor misses the mark for amusing and instead ventures into the territory of “too silly for me.” The same can be said for the chapter in which Cello’s father pursues an outrageously ridiculous plan of making up with his wife, with whom he’s had a fight. About the only one I really like is the one about Cello’s birthday, and how Dr. Guell sweetly buys her a present. Not only that, he’s clearly paid enough attention to her to know exactly what kind of present she would like best.

The relationship between Dr. Guell and Cello is the most interesting thing about the series at the moment, but I do rather wish for a more serialized story line. This is the halfway point of the series and though it’s very pleasant and guaranteed to foster some warm fuzzies, it feels like something more should be happening by now.

The Palette of 12 Secret Colors 2 by Nari Kusakawa: B+

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From the back cover:
It’s Christmas time on the island of Opal, and a visiting young Prince introduces holiday traditions to its residents. What could be more festive than the powers of the color wizards unleashed upon the season? But Dr. Guell is jealous of the relationship between the Prince and Cello and adds a sour note to the happy celebration. Then, find out more about Cello’s family and learn how she first bonded with Yoyo, her very special bird.

Review:
The episodic adventures continue in this volume, including a story about a visiting prince with a predictable secret, the tale of how Cello first met Yoyo, and a chapter about Cello’s family and her dad’s attempts to get some kind of facial expression out of terminally cool Dr. Gruell. Each of the episodes has something amusing about it, or some particular insight on character, but some are also a bit dull; I’m already kind of tired of seeing the triplet little girls turn up again and again.

The second story is my favorite, and not just because of Yoyo’s cuteness, though I suppose that is a factor. Mostly, though, I like it for the continuity. In an offhand remark in volume one, Cello mentions that she used to like climbing trees until she fell from one, and now she’s afraid of heights. This chapter includes that incident. It’s a minor thing, but I’m happy to see the seeds for it planted in advance.

While the current story structure is not short on charm, I still keep wanting this to be like a shounen manga somehow, with Cello acquiring mastery of new colors and her progression in skill clearly mapped. So far, she has improved enough to do well on a mid-term exam, but that’s sort of nebulous; the idea of knowing exactly how many of the twelve colors she can control and how many she has left has definite appeal.

The Palette of 12 Secret Colors 1 by Nari Kusakawa: A-

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From the back cover:
On the island of Opal live the world’s most colorful birds. The birds have attracted a school for aspiring “Palettes”—wizards who have the ability to borrow color from one object and paint its qualities on to another. Young Cello has the potential to be a great Palette, but she just can’t seem to control her power. As the end of freshman year approaches she’s on the verge of failing, so she’s going to need all the help her bird Yoyo can provide.

Review:
This is the story of Cello, a sixteen-year-old studying to be a Palette, or artisan with the power to control colors. It seems like a silly skill to have, but the volume shows different ways in which it can be useful. Cello is smart and aces the written assignments, but her practical abilities need work: she has the unique ability to manipulate color from a distance, but not the fine control required to craft the fine goods that fetch high prices from outsiders. Her problems with control result in her being splattered with color pretty frequently, requiring multiple visits to the infirmary to see the young school doctor, Dr. Guell.

In the chapters that follow, she and Guell foil two separate attempts to steal the village’s precious birds and also supply some fun for some little girls’ birthday. It’s true that these adventures are episodic, but they really don’t feel that way because they’re not pointless. In the wrong hands, I’d dislike the chapter with the random little girls, but Kusakawa uses it to reveal details about Guell’s background as well as to illustrate what a kind person Cello is.

I also like that romance is not the focus of the story. Cello has definite goals that she’s working towards and acquiring a boyfriend is not among them. That said, there are a few subtle moments that hint that she and Guell are starting to at least admire and appreciate one another.

What I love most, however, is Yoyo, Cello’s bird. I love Koh from Silver Diamond because he talks and is amusing, but a lot of Yoyo’s cuteness is because he is silent. He’s clearly intelligent, but must get his point across mutely. One of the most endearing things he does is kick Cello (cutely, I swear) every time she thinks or says something self-pitying or overly self-critical. I heart him.

Kusakawa’s distinctive artistic style is the same here as in Two Flowers for the Dragon, and I find it quite appealing, though the evolution of Dr. Guell’s appearance between the beginning and end of the volume is pretty major. It’s interesting how different the settings are for the two stories—Two Flowers is set in an oasis in the middle of a desert, while Palette takes place on a semi-tropical island, complete with palm trees and lush vegetation. Also, I really, really love the covers to this series. So much, in fact, that I’m gonna have to link to them. There’s an online preview at that site as well, if your curiosity is at all piqued.

The Palette of 12 Secret Colors is published by CMX. Four volumes have been released so far, with the fifth due on February 18, 2009. The series recently ended serialization in Japan and is complete at six volumes.

Wild Adapter

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Before I get to Wild Adapter, there are three other things I am very happy about right now:

1) Sharing manga leads to wonderful suprises: My sister has pre-ordered Bleach Volume 26 and Fullmetal Alchemist Volume 18 for me “in support of the manga industry” and as a thank you “for supplying happy, happy reading.” I was completely touched and more than a bit watery-eyed. Of course she will get to borrow these volumes from me when they arrive ;) Heh. Do I have an awesome sister or what? She’s even way ahead of me on reading Nana!

2) Mangatude. I’m having lots of fun there but I think I may be operating outside one of the goals of mangatude, which is to trade manga you don’t want for manga you really do want. Instead of stabilizing or shrinking, my manga collection keeps growing. You see, I have a lengthy wish list, but I did not have a lot to offer in trade. So instead of being patient I’ve been stocking up on popular titles from my local Half-Price Books stores that I can use to trade for the titles I cannot find. I’m hopeless. I know. But its an approach that is working.

3) Volume 1 of Natsuki Takaya’s new series Phantom Dream. It is now in my possession! I did a happy dance when it arrived. Its not often that I buy manga brand new, relying on my public library’s fairly extensive collection and haunting the used bookstores in the area, but for an author or series I love, I have a really hard time waiting.

Which brings me to my hopefully spoiler free review of Wild Adapter Volume 1, by Kazuya Minekura. …

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Shugo Chara!, Vol. 5

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By Peach-Pit
Del Rey, 176 pp.
Rating: T (13+)

Volume four was a tough one for our heroine, Amu, whose self-confidence was shaken to the core by the departure of Nadeshiko, the arrival of new Guardians, and the appearance of an “X” on her new diamond egg. Here in volume five, she’s finding her way back on track as everyone else falls to pieces. Yaya is feeling pushed out of her baby role by the brand new baby at home, Rima accidentally reveals her true self to her entire class, Kairi is falling too far in with the Guardians (especially Amu), and Tadase nearly loses his guardian character, Kiseki, to Easter’s latest scheme and his own self-doubt.

What really makes this story work is that the plot is just a vehicle for playing out the often painful internal growth of these young characters, and in this volume it is Tadase’s weaknesses that are most on display. While shopping for Guardian supplies, Tadase chooses a gift for Amu—a heart-shaped barrette that makes her look more like her transformed self, Amulet Heart. Amu’s dilemma here is not much different than that of other superheroes who must helplessly stand by as the objects of their desire fall for their alter-egos, except in this case, Tadase can’t pretend to be ignorant of her identity. The fact that Tadase can stand before Amu and knowingly declare his devotion to her would-be self is both incredibly true to horrors of young love, and quite revealing of how far Tadase has to go before his internal beauty will come close to matching what’s on the outside. All of these children are works-in-progress, of course, but it’s interesting to note that it is only young Kairi who, while facing personal demons greater than most, is able to say to Amu, “I like you just the way you are.”

This series continues to be fun, compelling, and unexpectedly insightful into the human heart, both young and old.

Review copy provided by the publisher. Review originally published at PopCultureShock.

Slam Dunk 2 by Takehiko Inoue: B+

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Volume two of Slam Dunk sure has been a long time coming! When we left off in volume one, hot-headed Sakuragi had grown frustrated with fundamentals training and quit the team. We pick up the story with Sakuragi regretting his decision, and he soon returns to practice after quickly polishing off a thug who’d been spoiling for a fight.

Although Sakuragi is still as clueless and boastful as before, he’s slightly less annoying than he used to be because he is starting to become interested in the sport more for its own sake than as a way to secure Haruko’s affections. Like a good shonen hero, his rate of improvement exceeds everyone’s expectations and he manages to impress the coach during an intra-team practice match despite needing to learn a special lesson about the value of teamwork.

The supporting cast gets a little more attention in this volume, most notably Assistant Captain Kogure and the team manager, Ayako, though they’re mostly relegated to reacting to the actions of others’ and/or calling out the names of moves like “Fly swatter!” The intra-team match is the highlight of the volume, giving readers an idea of how cool an actual game will be once the story advances that far. I’m personally looking forward to it!

Review copy provided by the publisher. Review originally published at Manga Recon.

Castle of Dreams

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By Masami Tsuda
Published by TOKYOPOP, 352 pp.
Rating: T (13+)

Castle of Dreams is a double-length anthology of short manga stories by Masami Tsuda, best known for the long-running shojo series, Kare Kano. TOKYOPOP’s single volume combines two anthologies that were published four years apart in Japan, and the two volumes read as very distinct entities.

The first three stories are fairy tales of a sort, one of which is actually set in the universe of Hans Christian Anderson’s “The Little Mermaid.” In each of these, the protagonist is eventually driven to call upon a sorcerer who grants wishes—a fairly common fairy tale convention. What makes these stories different from most is that the sorcerer is not necessarily a neutral player. He displays an unusual connection to the human world, and even quite a bit of compassion for it, lending an unexpected warmth to typically sinister settings without sanitizing the stories or dumbing them down.

In the second of these tales, for instance, the sorcerer grants a young woman’s wish to erase the day in which she met the man who would ultimately be the ruin of her people. When it becomes clear that their meeting and falling in love is unavoidable no matter how many days the woman might erase, the sorcerer resolves to set her free from her fate, simply because he granted the wish of the original Little Mermaid (from whom she is descended), and feels responsible for her plight. In the third story (the standout of the bunch), the sorcerer actually becomes imprisoned in his own spell, which has been overtaken by a young pageboy’s wish to escape the class constraints of his society and enter his own private world where he may be allowed to live happily with his nobleman half-brother. In this case, the sorcerer is as much at the mercy of the wish as the boy is, yet he still appears more concerned for the boy’s fate than this own. These stories are not extraordinary by any means, but they are fresh and familiar all at once, and have a lovely otherworldly quality as all good fairy tales should.

The second group of stories consists of four short romances. The first of these, “The Room Where an Angel Lives,” is a wistful tale of a young orphan boy and a lost little girl clinging desperately to each other in the slums of England’s industrial revolution. The two are eventually separated, sending the girl back to her family and the boy down a path of bitter ambition. Though this story is surely the weakest of the bunch, it evokes a real sense of the period and sets the tone well for the bittersweet collection to follow.

All the rest are modern-day teenage romances, though with none of the formulaic sameness that might suggest. The stories’ female protagonists in particular are wonderfully quirky and well-defined, particularly Chisato in “Awkward Relationship,” who prefers books to boys, and Kyouko in “Because I Have You,” who is tortured by volleyball. All of these young women are complicated but relatable, and Tsuda balances romance with humor easily, rarely succumbing to the lure of melodrama or fluff. The most unusual of the stories is “I Won’t Go,” in which the heroine, Tami, finds herself in love with two different boys, one whose similar background enables him to understand her most painful feelings, and another whose warm heart rescued her from those feelings at a crucial time in her life. Tami’s struggle with her emotional duality is written with a surprising amount of insight, especially considering the length of the story, and where she lands in the end is nicely surprising. Not all the romance ends happily, but in each instance, the protagonist has learned something important about herself and her world.

The greatest strength of this book, however, is the depth and complexity of emotion portrayed, making each relationship feel both very real and completely unique. It is a common pitfall for writers of romance to decline into writing the same romance over and over, and Tsuda never falls into that trap. What this really indicates is that Tsuda is not writing romance to play out her own fantasies, but rather to explore how people are shaped by love and attraction as they move through life, and the result is much more satisfying for the reader than pure wish-fulfillment fantasy could ever be. Even in the initial fairy tales, which are clearly fantasy, love is the catalyst in the character’s stories, but it is also what brings them down to earth.

The quality of Tsuda’s art varies over the course of the book, and the panel layouts of some stories are easier to follow than others, but in all cases, the characters are well-drawn and distinct, with faces that come to life on the page. The fantasy settings of the initial trilogy are quite lush—stunningly beautiful in spots—and form a visually cohesive whole, while the later romances provide a more eclectic look.

Though few of the stories in Castle of Dreams are truly remarkable, the volume as a whole offers a mixed bouquet of human feeling, with just enough color and delicacy to please.

Review copy provided by the publisher. Review originally published at PopCultureShock.

Comics in Memphis and Other Things

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Just a few quick things this morning! First of all, I won’t be at NYCC this weekend, because I have to be in Memphis for UPTAs (since hiring actors is part of my actual paying job). What this means, however, is I’ll be in Memphis, which brings me to the question I always ask when I travel:

Are there any cool comic/manga shops I should visit in Memphis? Anyone?

And now a couple of links regarding manga reviewers who are not me. :) First, we have two new reviewers at Manga Recon! You can read about them both here! I am not the new girl anymore, hurray! Secondly, Michelle has started writing occasional reviews over at Comics Should Be Good (home of the fabulous Danielle Leigh), and you can read her first review (for The Quest for the Missing Girl) here.

Lastly, Chris Butcher has a great post about Diamond’s new order minimums, and why he thinks it will kill the direct market. I admit I don’t buy much manga anymore from my local comic shop (unless it’s from their used shelf), partly because they don’t keep up their stock after things sell out so they rarely have whatever volume I’m looking for, but also because on the day a new volume is released, they almost never have it. I’ve blamed Diamond for this in the past, and I don’t know if that’s fair, but sometimes even when I’ve called to ask the store about a new release of a series I know they carry, I find it’s not even on the list for their upcoming shipment. Anyway. Manga is obviously not most comic shops’ bread and butter, so I doubt anyone cares much about that, but I would really hate to see comic shops die, and I’m sure most of you feel the same.

That’s all for now!

Legal Drug, vols 1-3

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Quick link! I have a review in today’s Manga Minis at Manga Recon for NETCOMICS’ Main Street in Elysium. It was hard for me to write a balanced review of this because I found it so distasteful. I think I did not succeed.

What I really want to talk about, though, is CLAMP’s Legal Drug. I know this is old hat for most of you, but I finally read it last night, and some thoughts popped to mind. …

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Two Flowers for the Dragon 3 by Nari Kusakawa: B+

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Shakuya, the heir to the dragon clan that rules an important desert oasis, has a rather complicated life. Not only does she turn into a dragon when her feelings grow too strong, but she also has two fiancés since the original one, who was missing for five years, suddenly returned with most of his memory missing. This third volume finds Shakuya being sent to a neighboring oasis to help regulate the flow of water that allows their crops to grow. Both fiancés and a bevy of squeeful handmaids, who delight in their mistress’s love triangle, accompany her.

The regulation of the water and the attempt to dispel a dangerous sandstorm takes a back seat to more personal drama, as Lucien encounters the woman who took him in when he was lost in the desert, who might also be the person with whom Shakuya’s father had an affair that resulted in his banishment from the dragon clan. The ultimate outcome of this meeting is kind of predictable, but it also introduces some new mysteries about Lucien’s time away from the village and the extent of Shakuya’s dragon powers.

I find Two Flowers for the Dragon to be a very fun read. The art is cute, the characters are likable, the women aren’t helpless, and the dialogue is great. In addition to that, it’s funny. Not so much in volume three, perhaps, with all its action, but I typically giggle several times per volume. Also, I think Kusakawa has some of the most amusing sidebar material I’ve ever seen.

Review copy provided by the publisher. Review originally published at Manga Recon.

Main Street in Elysium, Vol. 1

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By Masahiro Nikaidou
Published by NETCOMICS
Rating: 16+

Main Street in Elysium is a four-panel comic strip based on the idea that there is much humor to be found in women’s hatred of their in-laws. There are a few other running jokes (one, for instance, in which a pretty woman observes the mistreatment of a less pretty woman, each time confessing, “I’m glad I wasn’t born ugly”) but the vast majority of the strips concern women who hate their in-laws, often to the extent of becoming homicidal. One woman, for example, keeps her father-in-law outside in a doghouse. She serves him week-old leftovers or scraps from the garbage, and sometimes takes him out for walks on a leash, pointing out important landmarks like the funeral home and the cemetery. Another woman, Noriko, repeatedly attempts to murder her bedridden mother-in-law by means such as strangulation, poisoning, drowning, or pushing her wheelchair off a cliff.

This comic strip has won awards in Japan, but it’s difficult to reconcile that fact with its overwhelmingly mean-spirited tone. None of the in-laws appear to do anything to warrant their treatment. They accept their children’s abuse without complaint (though Noriko’s mother-in-law at least defends herself in order to stay alive), and seem to do little else outside of occasionally asking to go for a walk. There is some humor in the extreme politeness with which they address each other, as well as in the physical extremes to which the women will go in their attempts to do away with their hated relatives, but those jokes get old quickly, leaving the reader with a handful of characters who are just not very likable.

Nikaidou’s art is quirky, fun, and quite expressive at times. Unfortunately, the comic’s dark humor too often misses the mark.

Complimentary online access provided by the publisher. Review originally published at PopCultureShock.

Two Flowers for the Dragon 2 by Nari Kusakawa: B+

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From the back cover:
A mysterious old snake charmer compelled Shakuya to assume her dragon form and flew away on her back to his desert retreat. Now he is holding her captive and plans to marry her off. Needless to say, no one is happy about that, least of all Shakuya’s two fiancés, Lucien and Kuwan.

They’ve put aside their rivalry to join forces, head out into the desert and try to save the girl they both love. But their alliance may soon unravel when the tattoo on Shakuya’s arm representing Lucien begins to grow—a sign to Kuwan that he may be losing the competition for the Princess’s love.

Review:
Like volume one, this cover blurb has a phrase that’s a different color and font from the rest. This time it’s “two fiancés.” I wonder what it’ll be next time. “Turns into a dragon,” perhaps?

This volume picks up with Shakuya in the custody of kidnappers who want to marry her to their lord so he’ll have control of the Oasis of the Dragon, an important stop for desert travelers. Her reaction to all of this is great. Instead of weeping or despairing, she thinks, “This is infuriating!” and begins planning her own escape rather than waiting for one of the guys to rescue her.

Later in the volume, Shakuya decides that she wants to get to know Lucien and begins to ask him questions about his time in the desert. This nicely fills in some narrative holes while showing the progression of Shakuya’s feelings toward her suitors. Later still, the circumstances of Shakuya and Kuwan’s first meeting is also revealed. I started out preferring Kuwan to Lucien, since I tend to like serious and quiet characters, but he’s kind of getting on my nerves now. It seems he only makes an effort to be nice when he’s trying to beat Lucien and not particularly out of any true affection for Shakuya. Lucien, meanwhile, shows that he understands Shakuya pretty well. I’m quite interested in learning what exactly happened to him while he was missing.

One thing I didn’t mention in the review for volume one is that this series has really great dialogue and a good translation, to boot. Characters actually say things that sound intelligent and use a much broader vocabulary than typical manga characters do.

This volume also included a short story called “The Cogwheelers” about a non-human guy who’s responsible for building cogs that represent cause and effect for everything that happens on Earth. He’s having trouble grasping the ramifications, so breaks the rules and goes down to Earth to see what it’s really like. I typically don’t enjoy these kind of volume-padding short stories, but this one is quite good, especially considering it’s only the second thing Kusakawa had published.

Red Blinds the Foolish

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By est em
Deux Press, 192 pp.
Rating: Mature (18+)

“Red Blinds the Foolish,” the title piece in est em’s latest collection of short manga published by Deux Press, follows the story of Rafita, an up-and-coming matador in Madrid, and Mauro, a man who works at the meatpacking house that butchers the bulls Rafita kills. Having spotted each other at the bullring, the two fall into a sexual relationship, kept casual at first by Rafita’s travel schedule and proclivity for one-night stands. As their relationship grows and Rafito finds himself missing Mauro more and more, he begins to have nightmares about killing Mauro instead of the bull, leading him to experience fear in the ring for the first time in his life. The story is rich with metaphor involving love and death, and its lazy, sensuous tone lends a dreamlike quality to the men’s time together while heightening the sense of danger both in and out of the ring.

Both characters are complex and emotionally guarded. Yet despite the incidental quality of their relationship, they somehow create a universe of two, existing for each other while remaining unaffected by their day-to-day surroundings and the people who inhabit them. Mauro attends to his work and Rafito to his lovers, all by rote. It is as though they are real only to each other.

There is some insight into this provided for Mauro, at least, in a short chapter following the main story called “Corpse of the Round Table.” In that story, Mauro is introduced as a young man who gives up law school to take the meatpacking job in order to pay off debts left to his family by his father. In the story, he describes playing at bullfighting with his grandfather and confides that he always played the part of the bull. “Playing dead is actually pretty fun,” he says. “Lying perfectly still and waiting for someone to say something to you.” The final panel suggests that it is Rafita he’s been waiting for, to finally wake him from the dead.

The only unfortunate thing about the title story is that it doesn’t last for the entire volume. The later stories are nice, certainly, but with the possible exception of the final short, “Lumiere” (about a young man taking dictation from a bedridden author), none of them offer quite the same depth or potential. After such a wonderfully strong and complex start, it is difficult not to be disappointed when the first story’s characters are abruptly abandoned in favor of new ones. That said, no matter the length of the story, est em is a true gem among yaoi authors, and it would be foolish to look a gift horse in the mouth.

One of the exceptional things about est em’s work is that it is not obviously written for women, which is to say that its storytelling, characterization, character design, and attitudes about homosexuality bear little resemblance to typical boys’ love manga. There are no pretty, androgynous schoolboys or meticulously groomed hosts in an est em manga. Nor will you find a lascivious seme or timid uke playing out heteronormative stereotypes to help young women feel more comfortable with sex.

As in her earlier short story collection, Seduce Me After the Show, the men in Red Blinds the Foolish are stunningly real and absolutely male. Est em portrays real-life adult men in various stages of their lives—working, living, lusting, loving, entering new relationships or discovering new things about existing ones. Unlike most yaoi manga, though relationships are the focus, these stories don’t read as romance for its own sake. These men may sleep together and sometimes even fall in love, but their relationships with each other both in and out of bed are, above all, revealing of who they are and who they will be. The sex is the means rather than the end, and that makes good storytelling.

This time around, Deux has done readers a favor by hiring Matt Thorn to translate and adapt the entire book from the beginning, avoiding the instances of overly sparse, confusing dialogue that plagued some of the stories in Seduce Me After the Show. The book retains est em’s restrained style and her inclination to let the art tell the story, but it is much more consistently coherent. As with Seduce Me After the Show, est em’s art, full of sketchy lines alongside striking black, is reproduced cleanly and with care.

Despite the relative weakness of the later stories in the volume, Red Blinds the Foolish is an extremely thoughtful and engaging read that should appeal easily both to seasoned yaoi fans and to mature readers who simply enjoy good story.

Review copy provided by the publisher. Review originally published at PopCultureShock.

Ultimate Venus, Vols. 2-3

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By Takako Shigematsu
Published by Go!Comi
Rating: OT (16+)

At the end of volume one, Yuzu was left wondering why she’d been saved by her chief rival for the Shirayuki fortune, Iyo Hayashibara. As volume two begins, she and her bodyguard, Hassaku, head to the Hayashibara estate to confront Iyo, and instead find out that he is actually the body double for the real Hayashibara heir who is none other than Yuzu’s close friend, Haruka. Iyo is beaten and tossed out for his betrayal, and is later hired by Hassaku to act as a second bodyguard for Yuzu. Meanwhile, Yuzu realizes that she is in love with Hassuku, though he is careful to keep her at a distance. Things are further complicated in volume three by the introduction of a young filmmaker, Masaya, to whom Yuzu discovers she has been promised in marriage.

Though little more than a silly soap opera on the surface, Ultimate Venus offers some surprisingly rich moments. Yuzu’s private display of grief after discovering that Haruka’s friendship with her was a sham is truthful and touching, as is her distress when she is fooled into believing that Iyo has taken a bullet for her. The story’s constructs are melodramatic and packed with cliché, but underneath it all is a real story of a real girl growing up and discovering what’s important to her. In volume three, once Yuzu decides to be honest about her feelings for Hassaku, she finally begins to show some real confidence in her own strength of heart. Another treat in these volumes is the further development of Iyo’s character, which reveals him to be an unusually perceptive and complex young man.

Volume three ends on a rather dramatic note, as Yuzu determines to stand up to her grandmother, Mitsuko, and refuse the arranged marriage, promising more drama as well as more “screen time” for the stylish, sagacious Mitsuko, whose appearances were notably few in these volumes. Fortunately, with Yuzu’s growing confidence and resolve, Mitsuko is no longer the only strong woman in the series, a trend that will hopefully continue! It is the strength of Shigematu’s characters that allows this series rise above its superficial premise to deliver some genuine insight along with the fun.

Review copies provided by the publisher. Review originally published at PopCultureShock.

The Blade of the Courtesans

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By Keiichiro Ryu
Vertical, 304 pp.

Matsunaga Seiichiro is a master swordsman, trained by the legendary Miyamoto Mushashi, who has spent his entire young life in the mountains of Higo province cut off from the rest of the world. At the age of 26, as directed by his now-deceased master, Seiichiro leaves the mountains with nothing but his sword and a letter of introduction and finds himself in Edo’s pleasure quarter, Yoshiwara. When he discovers that the man to whom the letter is addressed is no longer living, Seiichiro is momentarily lost, but he soon finds some purpose in defending those in the quarter against the Yagyu clan, a fearsome group of ninjas who are loyal to the shogun. Not everyone is as they seem and as the story goes on, much is revealed about both the society Seiichiro has wandered into as well as his own personal heritage.

Set at the beginning of the Edo period, The Blade of the Courtesans is painstakingly woven into the fabric of history. Keiichiro Ryu’s characters stand alongside well-known historical figures and the author obviously has an extensive knowledge and deep love of the period. Unfortunately, this attention to history is also responsible for one of the book’s greatest flaws. Ryu frequently pauses the story to explain terminology or expound on historical fact, which, while interesting, breaks the flow of the narrative to a nearly fatal point. These pauses increase as the book goes on, pulling the reader out of the story for pages at a time to offer detailed explanations of its historical context, most of which have only minimal impact on the plot. At times, Ryu instead uses his characters to deliver this information, which is just as clumsy and almost as distracting.

Also clumsy is the novel’s narrative mode, which spells out far too much of each character’s thoughts and feelings, saving the author from having to figure out how to reveal these things organically through action and dialogue. Some of this may be due to the difficulty in translation, but the result in English just reads as lazy writing. As with the huge chunks of historical background, what Ryu really reveals here is his lack of skill as a novelist.

The story itself is a strange, meandering thing, sometimes appearing to have gotten a bit lost, much like its protagonist. It is strongest in the beginning, before becoming too deeply mired in the long historical passages. Though it does gain some momentum just before the end, the conclusion feels quite rushed, as major characters are shunted quickly to the side with very little explanation.

For all its awkwardness, however, The Blade of the Courtesans has some truly stirring moments. Early on, one character delivers a sudden, fiery speech to Seiichiro as they lay on a rooftop, proclaiming, “Living ought to be something more magnificent. It’s so fantastic that just thinking about it makes you sigh, makes your blood rush. But if it’s like this… if that’s all it is, then I’ll cast it all aside. Any time, I’m ready to die!” It is in moments like this that Ryu is at his strongest, letting his passion run out over the page. He lends his passion to several of the supporting characters and even occasionally to the dully-virtuous Seiichiro, particularly in his encounters with elite courtesan, Takao, and in his art with the sword.

Unfortunately, some of that passion is marred by philosophies and biases that, while doubtlessly appropriate to the time period, are difficult not to find offensive today. Much of the novel’s philosophical emphasis is placed on the lifestyle and beliefs of the Kugutsu clan, a nomadic group of wandering puppeteers, who call themselves “companions of the way.” The Kugutsu pride themselves on their lack of worldly entanglements, and particularly on the strength and autonomy of their women, from whom many of the Yoshiwara courtesans were descended. It is difficult, however, to swallow a vision of female empowerment in which a woman’s liberty is measured only by the number of men she will share her bed with. The story constantly describes the power of women in the Yoshiwara society, yet in the midst of an impassioned explanation of how the women are able to come to Yoshiwara to “rinse away their origins” and escape from the persecution of their clans, it is revealed that they are indentured to the various houses in the pleasure quarter (all owned by men) until their 28th birthday, at which time they may choose to get married or to remain courtesans for the rest of their lives. That these women, shackled to a system that values them only for their skills in lovemaking, are held up as the pinnacle of female beauty and sovereignty is inexpressibly sad.

Though The Blade of the Courtesans offers a level of historical detail that anyone with an interest in Japanese culture would find genuinely fascinating, its difficulties as a fictional narrative are many, rendering it an ultimately unsatisfying read.

Review copy provided by the publisher. Review originally published at PopCultureShock.