Comic Review: Ghosts

Ghosts by Raina Telgemeier

Book Review: The Shadow Cabinet

There was actually a novella that came out in-between this and The Madness Underneath called The Boy in the Smoke and looking at this post I think I did actually read three of the four stories but I have no idea where. If you can also find those stories I do recommend reading them at some point since Stephen remains an important character in the series but I don't think it's vital that you have to read them before you track down The Shadow Cabinet.

The Shadow Cabinet by Maureen Johnson

Book Review: Girl of Nightmares

Sorry that these reviews are up a bit later, had a few wrinkles with my schedule this week and I doubt that I'll be able to get tomorrow's review up on time so I'm going to apologize for that in advance as well. Other than that, I read Anna Dressed in Blood within the past year and thought it was a good book even with I wasn't completely thrilled with the ending, partially since I wasn't sure if the book had a sequel. As it turns out, yes it does and that both helps and hurts it.

Girl of Nightmares by Kendare Blake

Summary: Sometime has passed since Anna sacrificed herself to help kill the ghost that had attached itself to Cas's ghost killing blade and he has a bad feeling about it. He's plagued by nightmares and apparitions of her undergoing torture in the afterlife and wants to save her but there's still so much he doesn't know that it's time to find the people do who, the shadowing organization who made his knife and made his family into the people who wield it.

The Good: This is an odd detail but, even though it was a bit frustrating when Thomas and Carmel were fighting with each other (since you just know they'll get back together, plus it doesn't feel like long since I read the first book so it feels like the characters haven't even been together that long), I still appreciated the fact that they seemed to have a rather normal teenaged relationship with some ups and downs. Quite honestly those two were my favorite part of this book, I liked how they made Cas open up more and even came along with some of the ghost hunting, as dangerous as it might be, since I always prefer stories where you have several characters interacting and bouncing off of each other rather than just one on their own

The Bad: To get to the heart of the manner, I don't think this story needed to be told over two books. I felt like a lot of the second book just felt like fluff, I wasn't that interested in the order that created Cas's knife, couldn't exactly figure out how Blake was trying to write new character Jestine (I think she was going for a younger/morally ambiguous character, which would be hard to portray but I still wish it was done better), and then when the story finally got to where Anna was I didn't quite follow what was going on. Perhaps I was just tired or in a rush when I read it, I don't remember, but I do remember just feeling confused about what was going on and didn't like how everything ended for Anna. I wish the story had instead just ended in Anna and left it at that, albeit slightly differently so that it had been a real ending not the To Be Continued one it actually has. 


For this book I'll give it a 3 out of 5 since even though I disliked it it was written perfectly fine and fans of horror will still enjoy it (is there much YA horror out there? I don't see a lot but I'm not looking for it and I'm not sure if that's why then). I am still a bit interested in Blake's latest book regardless of this one, hopefully that one will be a little more to my tastes. 

Book Review: Madness Underneath

EDIT: Well this is a first, apparently this is part of a four book series, not a trilogy as I originally thought, so I'm having to change some things in the The Bad section. Doesn't change my feelings on the book but obviously if the series isn't a trilogy I can't refer to it as such!


 In case anyone is confused, I'm switching the book and manga reviews up this week since I only had a chance to grab manga/comics from the not-so-local-library on Wednesday, was sick on Thursday for a lot of the day, and just haven't had a chance to read anything beyond the second volume of Swan yet (and since it's been so long since I talked about the first volume I didn't feel like I would write a very good review). However, I have read this book, the sequel to 2011's The Name of the Star which was one of my favorite books that year and I've been dying (ha-ha, it's a book about ghosts) to read it since it was released in February and can certainly talk about that instead. However, much like Swan, while I remember the plot I had a hard time remembering some details about the individual characters which is never a good sign....


The Madness Underneath by Maureen Johnson

Summary: It's only been about a month since the American Rory was attacked and nearly killed by an ex-British-policeman-ghost-hunter (who was a ghost himself) at her London school and while she's not exactly eager to go back she's not happy where she is now either. But it appears that the British police have gotten wind of what else happened during the attack, namely that Rory has gone from someone who can simply see ghosts to someone who can kill them with a touch, and they want her back in London, and Rory isn't too happy about any of that. 

The Good: I still rather like Rory as a character, even though she does a lot of things I thought were dumb (and would have thought were dumb at her age) and I was surprised at how much I liked the London group as well, I hadn't remembered that. I was also happy that the story didn't immediately drop the school aspect of Rory's life or pretend that she could miss a month at a very high level school and still be doing fine in her classes, it was a touch of realism I don't often find in books of any genre and appreciated it.  

The Bad: I had some problems with how this book was laid out in regards to how it's going to fit into an entire series. There's no villain like there was in the first book until the very very end and, while that and another subplot might make for interesting conflict by the end, at this point they feel much less threatening than the villain of the first book which isn't generally how you're supposed to make it work. I was also hoping for a connection to the first book's villain which again, might happen in a later book (especially since the characters have mentioned how confused they were by the reveal and I doubt Johnson would have reminded the reader of that if she didn't plan to use it later on) but nothing happened here. And that's my overall problem with this story, it feels like the stereotype of the middle book in a series or trilogy, not much happens until the very end (where something happens that will make everything easier/harder for the main characters in the next book) and lacks both the plot and character development that the first book had. 



I was actually a bit less frustrated with the book before I, erm, laid out exactly why I was unhappy with it, but this was still a disappointing read none the less. I'm going to give it 2.5 out of 5 stars and hope that the third book, which I imagine will be out sometime next year, will be worth it.    

Webcomic Review Month 2013: Penny Dreadful, Polterguys Prince of Cats, Princess Princess

Whew, got the biggest batch of reviews for the month here, even though I'm a little sad I don't find as many great webcomics every year I have to admit it's nice that I don't have to make as many huge posts as this. Oh and the ComicMix March Madness tournament is still going on so if that's your thing make sure to go out and vote, think they've reached the quarter-final round as of writing this so it's going to finish up pretty soon!


Penny Dreadful by Maggie G Vicknair

The 20th century is barely a decade old and Penny Hart has found herself lost and alone in it. Through a series of strange events she finds herself in the employ of the Harker Institute of Super-Natural Studies and while she finds herself starting to enjoy her new life of adventure it's still a bit much to simply take in a stride.

As a heads up, this is one the webcomics which has a fairly dramatic art shift early on, apparently Vicknair completely changed the way she drew it starting in chapter two, so if you don't like the art very much in chapter one be sure to look at a later chapter before writing off the comic for that reason (and of course the art style does change and become more sophisticated as the story progresses as it does in practically every comic out there). As for the characters and plot I'm really fond of this one since the characters are just a touch sarcastic (well, more than a touch at times) and being a sarcastic person myself I occasionally wonder why characters aren't commenting on how strange their lives are. Despite this little extra self-awareness the copious supernatural elements of the story manage to feel just right for the story without anything out of place (although a little more exposition about how magic works in this world would be nice, I'm assuming that's simply coming later) and the story seems to be slowly revealing that there is a greater plot lurking behind the events of the individual chapters, can't wait to see what's going to happen!


Penny Dreadful can be read online and does not have a print version as of writing.


Polterguys by Laurianne Uy and Nathan Go

Fans of shojo manga will undoubtedly find something familiar about Polterguys but in a fun, enjoyable way. Like many a heroine, Bree finds herself living with a bevy of cute guys under strange circumstances but her's are a bit stranger than normal. While she's simply moved out of the dorms for a bit of piece and quiet the five guys living in her old house are all dead, none of whom can remember how they got that way, and there are demons out there who will happily hunt down a lost soul and send it off to wherever those souls go. In a moment of impulse Bree puts her own life on the line to give the boys a chance to find peace before they move on but can she really do anything to help? 

Bree is a likeable heroine whose relatable, has spunk, and also has a rather realistic experience of having college turn out to be different than she expected (although most of us didn’t have demons and ghosts to make the shift even harder). This first book neatly wraps up one plot while leaving plenty more for future installments and introduces a new one which might prove even more interesting in the end. I'm not sure when the comic is going to start updating again (as far as I can tell, from twitter and tumblr, I think Uy and Go have started outlining it but haven't gotten much farther so it's likely to be a while) but even if it's only as consistent as this first installment then I think it'll be worth the wait.

Polterguys can be read for free online or purchased as a book.


Prince of Cats by Kori M. Handwerker

Lee might be able to talk to cats but frankly that isn't a really big problem or concern in his life currently, high school is. In a small, conservative town where you can be rich or poor but never anything but straight and that certainly doesn't help when his relationship with his best friend Frank starts to change and neither of them feels quite sure where they want, or even expect, it to end up.

Yep this is another story with queer characters in it and, while there hasn't been anything that would be considered graphic by anyone so far, the about page does indicate that there will be some non-graphic sex scenes later on, readers with delicate sensibilities or a habit of reading webcomics at work be warned. Funny enough this is also yet another comic done in watercolors which I'm seeing more and more of these days and I rather like it. Obviously this has no impact on the story but I still like the feeling it gives. Getting to the actual story, it's a little slow moving and awkward but honestly that sums up a lot of high school as well. I am happy to hear that there are going to be other gender/sexual identities present in the story as well (since it always seems odd to me whenever you have a large cast of characters and every single one of them is straight and Prince of Cats is developing a pretty large cast of background characters), although a bit sad that it sounds like there will be an asexual character but they won't even recognize what they are in story. I can certainly relate to that, and it sounds like they'll be a minor character in the story anyway, but I at least hope I can recognize who it is.

Prince of Cats can be read online and the first few chapters are also available in print form.

Princess Princess by StrangelyKatie

I know I said that I wasn't covering any finished comics this year but I completely missed that this one was in fact finished so I'll just slip it in here. Princess Princess is a rather quick tale about a princess locked up in a tower whose recused by, well, another princess. The story is based on that simple idea but fleshes out its two princesses quite well into distinctly different people with their own problems and lives, it doesn't just change one of them from a prince and call that a day. It's cute, quick, funny, yes the two girls do like each other as well, and smarter than you'd expect so I recommend everyone to check it out over here if you have some time. And while you're there I'd also recommend another of Katie's comic's, which I've seen around on tumblr before but hadn't realized it was hers, which is even shorter and nicely bittersweet.


2012 "P" comics

2011 "P" comic (which weirdly enough also finished up within hours of me writing about it, I'm amused by the similar timing anyway)

Book Review: Anne Dressed in Blood

SO, last summer I read a book called Death Watch, didn't really like it (the pacing just dragged) and completely unrelated to not liking it I just had a nagging feeling in the back of my mind that this was a lot different from what I was expecting. And you guys remember how last week in my Chime review I said that normally when I read a book and it's completely different from what I thought I had heard about it that means I confused it with another book? That was foreshadowing for this review actually, apparently I confused Death Watch with this book. In my defense, kid comes to new town having taken up the mantle of his father which involves dealing with malevolent ghosts and his mother seems to be connected and there's a dead girl as the love interest? That's enough specific detail to get me mixed up easily, especially considered how little information a blurb/jacket copy gives about a book anyway (personally I think that a lot of jacket copy is crap but that's a rant for another time).


Anna Dressed In Blood by Kendare Blake

Summary: Cas, like his father before him, kills the ghosts that linger around and cause trouble for the living which involves a lot of moving around and a fair amount of danger. So when he gets a tip about a particularly vicious ghost he and his mother head on up to Canada to deal with her and find a much thornier problem than they were expecting.

The Good: I had an amusing thought reading this book, normally the way that an urban fantasy/supernatural YA book plays out is that you have a girl in town, an ordinary girl, and then a strange guy comes to town and she's dragged into adventure. This book is actually told from the point of view of said guy, which has been done before I'm sure but I can't think of any titles off the top of my head, which has the real benefit of making Cas seem, well, not like an ass and he comes off as a fairly likable and sympathetic main character. The side characters also come off pretty favorably once the story gets moving along, I was really surprised at how sympathetic Anna came off considering, well, just look at the title.

The Bad: Originally I was going to say "I really hope this book has a sequel since it has just enough loose ends that it really needs one" but I actually found a cover for what I assume is the sequel (Girl of Nightmares I believe is the title) when getting the cover for the review so nevermind! I am a little worried that there won't be enough material for another book (I'm also seeing this labled as the the Anna Series and, considering you usually have more than two books in a series, usually anyway, I have no idea how there's enough material left for two books) since Anna's backstory is explained, Cas's backstory is explained, there's a good chance he'll be elsewhere which means new side characters, considering how solid this book was I'd hate to see (quote unquote) ruined by a less-than-stellar follow-up, crossing my fingers that this next one is good!


So 3.5 out of 5 stars for this one, don't think I'll reread it so I probably won't buy it but I'll certainly recommend it to people who like their supernatural YA to have some horror in it (which I don't know if there's simply less of or if I don't run into it as much, probably both). Getting closer to being back on schedule folks, just bear with me until March and then it all changes again!

Book Review: Kieli: In the Sunlight Garden Where It All Began

Well this is quite a bit later than I expected, I had originally hoped to have this review done months ago but I got delayed purchasing the second book and then I just had so much to read that it got pushed to near the bottom of the stack. But we're getting close to the end folks, the last two books come out this year in English and hopefully I'll have a chance (ie, the money) to pick them up at some point from a TRSI sale.

Kieli volumes 5 and 6, The Sunlight Garden Where It All Began Written by Yukako Kabie  

Summary: Kieli and Harvey, still searching for Beatrice, end up in a town that has a lot of memories for Harvey and Kieli learns more about his past than even Harvey can remember.

The Good: Well the story has finally shed some light on Harvey's past and while it didn't do anything I didn't expect it was still solid and brought up one or two interesting ideas (like the fact that the Undying literally are different people than they were in life, so different that you can have a ghost of their past selves that's not just an impression left on a place). The colonel also got a bit more backstory, really by now the story has explain all the main players pasts so I'm curious what it's going to spend the last three volumes doing. 

The Bad: While I was really optomistic that a two book story would really work here it just felt like Kabie was puttering around a lot of the time, trying to fill space with a story that was a bit more than one novel but not big enough for two. There are a surprising number of side stories in here and, even though they all feature characters who become important later on, most of the time they felt like fluff and I was annoyed. I really do think there was a better way to structure this story, even if I'm not sure how to do it myself. Also, we seem to have hit a bit of a dead end for Kiele's story (which was to find out more about her mother and, to a smaller extent, the Undying she had been traveling with) and it's going to take an extremely contrived coincidence to get that subplot moving again which is already bugging me.


So, certainly not one of the series stronger entries but a very necessary one. I think I can see what's turning in the background that will become important in the later books, now to hope that those books meander a bit less than this one. But first, I think I need to catch up with Book Girl (which also ends soon-ish, next January I think) and Spice & Wolf, curse you Yen Press for putting out so many series when I don't have the time or money for all of them!  

Spring Anime 2012 round-up

Once again I am later than everyone else but to make up for it I have all my reviews in one place (so, erm, it's long, I had just hit a fourth page on Word when I was writing these up).Did not try Jormugand, Sankarea, Hyouka, Kuroko no Basuke, or Nyarko-san but might later on if I somehow get bored, they all sounded like something that may catch my fancy but I already have enough shows I'm committed to watching to keep me entertained (plus Funimation still hasn't put up Sankarea, y'all sure you know what the word "simulcast" means?). Still following Bodacious Space Pirates and Aquarion Evol in addition to Legend of Korra, thank god MLP:FiM just finished up or I'd be spending my entire Saturday watching cartoons. Funny enough my one and a half fansub shows this season are both mecha (half since I watch Evol on a weird schedule so it only half counts), and the fact that I was already committed to one and a half shows is why I didn't try out Hyouka (the entire reason this is delayed so much, I had expected it to be simulcast which obviously didn't happen). Enough mindless rambling though, let's ramble about the actual shows!

Accel World: Set a few decades in the future, high school life in Japan is similar to today’s except that the technology has rapidly progressed and everyone is now permanently wired into the ‘net. This works in Haruyuki’s favor since he uses his favorite online games to escape the bullying at his school and it turns out that someone has noticed his skills, student body president who is only known by her handle Kuroyukihime, and recruits him to help her in a different kind of game called Brain Burst. I checked out the first chapter of the manga adaptation which didn’t really catch my attention but the anime did. It’s paced well, looks good (do wish Haruyuki was a bit less deformed but I’m not going to obsess over that like some viewers have) and while the plot is a bit on the simple side it works just fine. I can’t tell at this point if I’m going to keep enjoying the series as much as I have, especially since it’s “plot twists” seem rather predictable at this point, but for the moment I’m having fun with it.

Accel World has been licnesed by Viz Media and can be viewed by USians either on hulu or on their site using the hulu player, Canadians are in a pinch here.

Dusk Maiden of Amnesia (Tasogare Otome x Amnesia): Many years ago Yuuko was a student at a strange high school and died under mysterious circumstances and now her body lies beneath the Paranormal Activity clubroom. She claims that she’s not interested in why she died or any of those details, she can’t even remember them to start with, but when Teiichi comes along and is able to see her she starts to become a little more curious and starts the club in order to find out. Honestly that’s all that has happened in the first two episodes (the majority of the first episode was taken up by a hilarious segment showing the episode first from the point of view of the club member who can’t see ghosts and then from the POV of the two who can) and the show has more fanservice than I care for* but somehow the show has grabbed me anyway and if it’s going to be a short series then I’ll be sure to stick around and see what ends up being revealed.

The show has been licensed by Section 23 and for the moment can be viewed on Crunchyroll.

Eureka Seven AO (Astral Ocean): The follow-up to the original 2005 show Eureka 7: Psalm of the Planets (which I have seen, it was just back in 2009 back when Anime News Network was starting to stream shows), Ao has grown up in Okinawa under the guidance of a local doctor when his mother (who is clearly Eureka) vanished while he was small (no mention of his father but it’s Renton almost for sure) and has endured harassment ever since for being an “outsider”. But when a monster emerges from the alien scrub coral and starts spreading havoc it seems like Ao is one of the best chances they have to save the island. But for older viewers a few things seem off, the series is set on a modern looking Earth in 2025 (instead of 12005 on a changed Earth like the original series) with scub coral attacks dating back to the 1940s. I think it’s an alternate universe here so on the one hand I want to say that people who have read a bit about the original but not seen it can follow but at this point it’s not quite safe to say. Ao is a more likeable protagonist than Renton so far and I never disliked Renton to start with, although I am a little hesitant on who seems to be the female lead Naru but I’m warming up to her fast. At first glance the two shows seemed very different but I can now see a number of similarities and I think I’ll end up liking this a lot.

Fate/Zero II: Continuing mere minutes from where the first half left off, Fate/Zero is a record of the fourth Holy Grail war (10 years before the 5^th war in Fate/Stay Night) where pairs of Masters and Servants (heroic spirits summoned just to fight in this war) fight to the last pair standing to receive the wish granting grail. And fight they do, almost half the servants are gone by the time I write this and there has been fighting amongst the pairs as well, much like the first half the show loves to have long monologues on philosophy and morals between characters and then spend the next ten minutes showing a beautifully done fight sequence. I’ve really gotten into the show now, enough that I’m planning on watching F/STN over the summer once this finishes and even though I’ve guessed/been spoiled enough to figure out how this story is going to end I can’t wait to see it play out, as triumphant or tragic as it may be.

While not licensed per-say in the US, each new episode can be viewed on the Japanese NicoNico site with English subtitles and on Crunchyroll a week later. 

Hiiro no Kakera: When Tamaki's parents suddenly get jobs oversees, something that seems a bit suspicious to her, she moves in with her grandmother and discovers that she was brought there to be the next "Tamayori Princess," someone who deals with the spirits in the area and whose power seems to be growing. In a twist that shows it's dating-sim roots there are five attractive men assigned to look after her and the chemistry begins! While I can easily see the appeal of dating-sim games I don't really see the appeal of the animated adaptions since they take out the best part, actually getting to choose what to do and which guys to get closer to. So this one gets a pass from me, although I am tempted to make a plushie out of that adorable fox ghost mascot.

Hiiro no Kakera is streaming on Crunchyroll. 

Kids on the Slope (Samakichi no Apollon): One of my most anticipated shows of the season, Kids on the Slope makes up half of the noitaminA spot and focuses on transfer student Kaoru who has just moved to Kyushu in 1966 for his father’s job and expects this move to be like all the others, another chance for him to be isolated and lonely in his new surroundings. But things go a little differently this time around thanks to the friendly class president Ritsuko and delinquent classmate Sentarou who introduce the piano playing Kaoru to a new kind of music, jazz. I’ve only had a chance to check out the first episode so far but I really liked the vibe it gave off. The setting was different, the music was great and the characters already feel a bit rounded. I am really worried at how this show is going to compress all nine volumes of the manga into just 12 episodes, especially since it sounds like their aren’t any subplots that can be easily cut out, but fingers crossed and hoping for the best!

Section 23 has already licensed the show and it can be viewed on Crunchyroll.

Lupin the III-A Woman Named Fujiko Mine: I saw the first episode of this show on accident actually, I was watching a livestream and the streamer decided to show the latest incarnation of the Lupin the III franchise (which can be summed up as Lupin is a famous thief who likes to steal difficult things because of the challenges they present).  As I had already figured out from the reviews I’d read, this isn’t the show for me but it’s a pretty cool show. I’m not a big fan of Lupin, like many my only experience with the franchise is The Castle of Caligstro (which I didn’t  like that much) and the whole phantom/gentleman thief genre is hit or miss with me to start with. All of that said, you don’t need much familiarity with the Lupin franchise to follow this show and it looks gorgeous (to quote a friend, “they blew the budget of three anime studios in the first five minutes of this show”) in it’s super detailed retro style. Funny enough the copious amount of fanservice in the first episode didn’t bother me either which I think might be because the show not only has a female writer (Mari Okada whose work I’m plenty familiar with) but also a female director (Sayo Yamamoto who did Michiko to Hatchin which I still need to get around to seeing) and I wonder if that had just enough of an influence on the show to make the fanservice less annoying. In any case, Funimation is now streaming the show and if this sounds at all interesting I recommend people check it out (just be careful where you do however, the first episode is seriously NSFW because of Fujiko’s frequent stripping to distract the male characters).

Show is being streamed by Funimation on their website, you do need a free account to view it however due to the boobies.

Medaka Box: Tried this one out because, well, it was on Crunchyroll and I was bored? I also had a raging headache at the time and I’m not sure if that contributed to my feelings on the show or not but this just didn’t quite work. The premise is simple enough, Medaka is the new president of her high school and her first act is to create a suggestion box for the students and her first request is to clean up the kendo dojo, and by clean out they mean kick out all the delinquents who have taken up residence there. The problem is that Medaka just isn’t that interesting a character, she feels a bit like a Maniac Pixie DreamGirl to the male lead whom I suspect is actually the main character, and is simply so out there (with her proclamations that she will fix everything for no reason other than the joy of helping others) that I couldn’t take the show seriously and didn’t find it funny either. The premise reminds me a lot of Sket Dan, which I read the first chapter of a year or so ago, but at least there the series focused on comedy, here the show just feels disjointed and like it’s trying to do two different things at once.

This show is streaming on Crunchyroll as I mentioned earlier.

Polar Bear Café (Shirokuma Café): The lone josei offering of the season is a strange one, a comedy series set in a world where humans and animals live everyday lives with each other, the first episode shows the character Panda (who, true to his species, is rather lazy and would rather lay around all day eating bamboo) trying to find a job and eventually ends up with part time work as a panda in the local zoo. A large chunk of the show also takes place in the eponymous Polar Bear Café which shows off the best bits of the series humor with it’s strange puns and odd situations (plus, if you’re familiar with Japanese seiyuu then there is plenty of humor to be had in hearing them voice various animals). I did laugh a few times but I don’t think that this kind of humor would stay funny to me for an entire season (and in general I prefer series where humor is a secondary genre, not the main one like here), but I’m sure plenty of other people will enjoy it enough to make up for me.

Currently the show is unlicensed but it is streaming on Crunchyroll.

Saint Seiya Omega: I’m not familiar with the original Saint Seiya at all, beyond a basic plot synopsis that is, but I really liked the art style for the show and that I was familiar with. From the same people who did Casshern Sins and Heartcatch Precure (which I really need to see) I had been reminded of just how much I liked their retro-esque designs last fall when they did an episode of Mawaru Penguindrum and I decided that was enough of a reason to give this show a shot. And it seems that not much knowledge of the original Saint Seiya is needed to get this show, it seems to be a sequel where we start off with main character Kouga who is being put through some brutal training to become a “saint” who will one day protect the goddess Athena and he’s not particularly happy with this choice. It’s a super shonen-esque show with calling your attacks, hot blooded determination trumping experience and mysterious mentors calling upon Kouga to use some kind of inner strength he has, although I have no idea if the original show had magical girl-esque transformation sequences as well (looking at the team’s previous work I could easily see this being their own flair). In the end the show didn’t do enough things differently for me to want to continue, think I’ll just track down Heartcatch Precure sometime to get my fill of the artstyle that way instead.

Saint Seiya Omega is streaming, like a lot of other things this season, on Crunchyroll.

Space Brothers (Uchuu Kyodai): Set a few decades into the future, brothers Mutta and Hibito both had the same dream as kids, to become astronauts and explore space. Of the two however only Hibito has been able to achieve this dream while Mutta has been recently fired from his lucrative job as a car designer for head butting his boss. But even if Mutta has pretended to forget his dream his family hasn’t and he soon finds himself taking the JAXA [link] exams to become an astronaut. Hmm, realistic, near-future science-fiction (can it even be called that?) with an older protagonist? Sounds fun and sounds different, the pacing is a bit slower than most of the other shows out here but it sounds like the show will be running for a full year so it has the time to set a steady pace. I am a bit amused that Mutta has the same VA and similar appearance to Kotetsu from Tiger and Bunny last year, then again I remember the VA (Hiroaki Hirata) joking last year that after that role he’s now the “ojisan” actor and maybe that’s coming true…

Streaming on Crunchyroll.

Tsuritama: The other half of this season’s noitaminA timeslot and from the same director who did [C], Mononoke, and Trapeeze, Yuki is also a transfer student as he moves to Enoshima, has also moved around a lot and despite that also still gets panic attacks whenever he tries to introduce himself at his new school. Given the, odd nature of his panic attacks (outwardly he just makes strange expressions but inwardly he imagines being swallowed up by a rising wave) he’s also short on friends and not expecting to make any but self-proclaimed alien Haru, also a transfer student, has taken an interest in Yuki (as well as moved in with them) and seems intent on dragging him and two other guys all over town fishing. This show gave me a lot less to go on than Kids on the Slope and if it wasn’t noitaminA I would’ve considered dropping it since it was just so odd (actually, given who the director is and my strong feelings on the ending of [C] this still isn’t out of the picture). Right now I’m going to give it a few more episodes and see if I get into the swing of it since I have absolutely no clue right now what it’s trying to do.

Like Kids on the Slope, Tsuritama has been licensed by Section 23 and is streaming on Crunchyroll.

Zetman: In a dark and edgy setting, Jin was created as an experiment, a “player” with superhuman and near demonic abilities, but rescued as a baby by a man he grew up to call Grandpa. His grandpa was killed by a rouge player and soon after Jin’s own powers activated and ever since he’s tried to not get close to others to keep them safe. Another case where we’re getting a severely compressed adaptation (the entire manga series in one cour, sounds like they’ve already had 20+ chapter timeskips) but it wasn’t the pacing or such that put me off the series, as a non-manga reader the first two episodes flowed alright even though you can see it was compressed, I’m just tired of seeing “dark and edgy” shows. I might give this a go again later if I get bored, although given how much I have to watch I don’t foresee that happening. So it’s a case where the show isn’t bad, just not for me.

Just like this post started, Zetman has been licensed by Viz Media and is being streamed by them as well.

And that's all from me! So, seven new shows to follow, two continuing, four or five I might try/follow anyway (since it seems like every season I end up following one show I don't even mention here), and a giant backlog for when I get bored. And, given that all the shows I watch air between Thursday afternoon and Sunday evening I do get a bit bored by Wednesday, or I could use that time to catch up on live action shows.... 

*yes Japan, boobs are squishy and bounce when you don’t wear a bra, moving on

Comic Review: Anya's Ghost

Wow, sorry for the delay guys, I had a big midterm project (gaaaah) that ate almost all my free time last week (that and watching a few more shows before I did the fall review page) and I just haven't had any time to write this thing. So today's usual book review is being pushed back to Sunday and there won't be a movie review on Sunday since again, haven't had any time to watch any movies. There are a few movies my roommates has that I've been meaning to watch so I should have something for next week and then November is going to get interesting....

The cover of this book caught my eye at the local library (it was on display with some other comics) and after a minute or two of browsing I remembered that I had read a short preview for it on Tor.com (you can see it here) and liked what I saw but didn't think I'd have a chance to read the rest. So, since I had this wonderful chance, and it's getting close to Halloween here in the US, I thought it would be an appropriate read.

Anya's Ghost by Vera Brosgol

Summary: Anya isn't a popular girl in school but she's getting by most days. Until she falls down a hole, meets a ghost and then has to deal with a seemingly helpful ghost in her love life.

The Good: The story was short, flowed well and was a fairly fun read. The supernatural element worked well, the resolution to the romantic sub-plot was different and, while some of the things about Emily weren't the most original plot points either, they worked well and made sense. It's a nicely done story that I can see working for either the middle grade or young adult crowd and I enjoyed it.

The Bad: The very ending of the story felt a little cliched (some of the conversation does anyway, Anya's actions seem sensible) and I thought her change in heart towards her family was just a little too fast. I'm not sure how it could have felt more believable in that respect, the story was moving so quickly at that point, but it made the ending feel a little too neat over all.

The Art: The book has the same color scheme as the cover so you can see that it's not in full color but it's not in black and white either, is there a term for a three or four color scheme? Regardless, the page layouts flow well (although I do wish the book had been split into chapters or something, it's easier for me to read books in chunks these days rather than hope I find a good stopping point in time) and the art worked well. Anya managed to look like an actually curvy teen (as opposed to looking rail thin and the audience having to take her word for it), all the characters looked different from each other and it was a nice touch to see how Emily's design changed a little over the story as foreshadowing. 

So I'm happy that I got this one out and it was a nice read for the Halloween season. Speaking of which, next week's comic is also going to have a bit of a supernatural/horror theme, the horror/supernatural/magic genre really is a bit one in comics isn't it?  

Book Review: Soulless

Augh, sorry about that guys, I posted on twitter saying this review is delayed but if you don't follow me there and didn't get the message I'm sorry, I was preparing for a con last week and just ran out of time to do that and update here (and the review is up late tonight since now I'm trying to catch up with everything/look for photos of me and my friends, people upload their photos fast these days). So the schedule for the rest of the week is thus, either a movie or anime review Wednesday, comic on Thursday, book on Friday and then back to a regular update schedule next week, I'll even try to write up Monday's review early so that doesn't get delayed.

So, Soulless! I've been trying to read this book for over a year but, despite the fact that it's in the catalog in my local library, I don't think they actually have the book and I hadn't checked to see if the other libraries had it instead. But recently I found out that there was an ebook copy of the book and decided to try that instead and was pretty pleased with it, I'll talk more about that after the main body of the review.

Soulless by Grail Carriger

  Don't have that much to say about the cover, mostly because I'm still embaressed about the time I thought someone had stolen the image (I believe it was Clockwork Couture) and it turns out that Carriger got the image from them and with their permission. The image just fit the book so well that I didn't even stop to think that it was a pre-existing image, which does show how well the picture works for the book.

Summary: Alexia Tarabotti is a bit of an odditity since she is a 25 year old spinster living in Victorian London and fairly happy with her life. But she's actually even stranger than that, in a world with vampires and werewolves and where the amount of "soul" people have determines if they will survive the transformation to the undead, Alexia is soulless and a mere touch from her renders all the undead normal again. All of this culminates in her getting entangled

The Good: While some people may debate this* Soulless is set in a steampunk world (with lots of nice details about the setting) with a more supernatural conflict which is a nice blend of genres and fans of either should enjoy the book (romance fans should also love this story since that's also a major part of the book). I found it to be a pretty quick read and something was always going on in every scene and the romance managed to strike a nice balance between smutty^ and slutty so it a fun little book to read.

The Bad: At times the prose just feels a little off. It has a tendency to repeat itself, the pacing doesn't always feel quite right and sometimes the characters just act/react in strange ways. It almost feels a little too unpolished to be a real book and more like a story you could read online (really good but needs some oversight to make it even better). The plot is a bit predictable, especially with how the romance progresses, so if anyone is reading this book with the hope that the blending of genres might produce something really new and exciting I'm sad to say that nothing really new came from it.  

As for the e-reader, I downloaded an e-reader from Adobe and was fairly pleased with it. I could make the pages/text bigger which was nice and could add in bookmarks to make finding my place easier. I do wish I could scroll down the page (since I like keeping whatever text I'm reading towards the middle of the page) but no matter how I tried to do that (keyboard, touchpad, the side bar) it would just go to the next page instead which was a bit frustrating. All in all however the reader worked much better than I expected and I will be sure to check out other e-book only books my library has in the future.

 *just came across some blog post debating if Soulless "bustlepunk" not "steampunk" which just sounds like an awful lot of nitpicking to me
^which I suppose shows this isn't a YA book, some people get pissy if a YA book even has something as tame as kissing in it