When Mai Takiyama breaks an expensive camera belonging to ghost hunter Kazuya Shibuya, he tells her she can work off the debt by acting as his assistant. Thus, Mai is introduced to a world of spirits, curses, and exorcisms as well as Kazuya’s arsenal of gadgetry used to scientifically measure paranormal activity.

To start with, most of the spirit activity the Shibuya Psychic Research team investigates takes place on high school campuses, but the series eventually does branch out into things like mansions, churches, and secluded restaurants. In addition to Mai and Kazuya (dubbed Naru for his narcissistic tendencies), SPR employs Lin-san, Naru’s quiet yet capable assistant, and a variety of mediums and exorcists. Together, they fight crime spirits.

As the series continues, the cases gradually become gorier, though this does not necessarily result in heightened creepiness. The first volume is actually probably the best for maintaining spooky tension throughout; there’s just something about watching spectral phenomena on a video monitor that adds to the atmosphere. My favorite case is actually not gory at all, nor is it one of the longer ones. Instead, it’s the side story “Silent Christmas” (included in volume four), about the spirit of a boy who used to be an expert at hide-and-seek.

The characters are kind of a mixed bag. I like Mai, who is spunky and generally level-headed. It’s especially noteworthy that, although she has feelings for Naru, she never lets them get in the way of her work and whole volumes will pass without her dwelling on him at all. Naru’s also pretty interesting, even though he does have the unfortunate habit of being rude and insulting on occasion. Alas, few of the supporting characters are developed in any meaningful way and one is often left to ponder what purpose they serve. The sum total of information on one particular character is that he’s a young-looking priest from Australia. This guy has appeared in nine volumes so far!

The series’ two long-running story arcs focus individually on Naru and Mai, with varying degrees of success. The gradual development of Mai’s intuitive ability is well-integrated into early volumes, and even after her powers are confirmed several volumes later, they continue to develop. By contrast, tiny nuggets of information on Naru’s mysterious origins and possible powers are doled out sparingly and left to hang without resolution. It’s only in volume nine that we actually get some concrete evidence of his own psychic abilities.

After volume five, there’s a noticeable slide in quality. I attribute this to the end of Ghost Hunt’s serialization in Nakayoshi and the beginning of direct-to-tankouban releases. The art becomes inconsistent after this point, reminding me of American comics with the way certain characters’ facial proportions change in every panel in which they appear. The characterization also suffers and many cases have moments where explanations don’t make much sense.

The ninth volume is an improvement over the few preceding it, and reveals some answers about Naru’s mysterious “capabilities.” At the very least, it gives me hope that the series might once again produce something really good. For now, I can really only recommend the first five volumes.

VOLUME ONE

Summary: After accidentally breaking an expensive camera, Mai is drafted to help with the investigation into alleged spirit activity in an old building on her high school campus. Despite her expectations, she enjoys the experience and, at the end of the volume, accepts a job working in Naru’s office.

Creepiness Factor: Low. There are plenty of mysterious sounds and accidents in the old building, but the only truly creepy thing is a chair that appears to move on its own.

VOLUME 2

Summary: The Shibuya Psyshic Research team investigates a residence with a deadly history: every pre-teen child who has ever lived there has died. The case hinges on a creepy doll owned by the 8-year-old girl currently residing there.

Creepiness Factor: Low. And this is coming from someone with childhood trauma concerning a creepy doll.

VOLUME 3

Summary: Many strange incidents and ghost sightings have been reported at a high school that has recently been abuzz with the discovery that one of the students has psychokinetic abilities. Mai’s powers of intuition lead Naru to test her for psychic ability.

Creepiness Factor: Zero. A very cute scene between Naru and Mai makes up for that, though.

VOLUME 4

Summary: Yet more strange incidents at a high school, making three such cases in four volumes. This time, events seem to focus on the spirit of a student who had a grudge against the school. This volume also features a great side story about the spirit of a boy, expert at hide-and-seek, who wants to be found.

Creepiness Factor: Low. There isn’t much in the main story itself, but the resolution of the side story is pretty creepy.

VOLUME 5

Summary: The case that began in the fourth volume is concluded here. Although the story isn’t anything particularly special, the solution is more of a group effort than previously, and there are some great scenes of conflict between the two leads.

Creepiness Factor: Low. There’s one spooky scene in a nurse’s office, especially after the spirit menacing Mai suddenly disappears. Somehow, that’s always worse than a sudden appearance.

VOLUME 6

Summary: Plot trumps characterization in this installment, when the SPR is hired by the Prime Minister to research a series of unexplained disappearances at a mansion.

Creepiness Factor: Medium. Prior volumes haven’t featured much blood, but this time Mai’s precognitive dreams include plenty of it.

VOLUME 7

Summary: The Case of the Creepy Mansion (not actual title) concludes. Art and characterization continue to be not as good as in the first five volumes of the series.

Creepiness Factor: Medium. The best part was when messages from murdered spirits appeared all over the walls.

VOLUME 8

Summary: A secluded restaurant is cursed—whenever ownership changes hands, the transfer is accompanied by many deaths. In the course of the investigation, Naru is possessed by one of the spirits.

Creepiness Factor: Low. There are a couple of panels of a possessed child grinning eerily. That’s about it.

VOLUME 9

Summary: The team works together to determine the cause of the curse, freeing Naru in the process. When he awakes, he finally reveals his powers and confronts a wrathful chunk of driftwood. I snark, but it’s actually fairly cool, and meaningful progress on the “Mystery of Naru” plot line is always welcome.

Creepiness Factor: Low. A bunch of frog-like spirits crawling on windows and one possessed middle-aged guy lurking menacingly amongst some shrubbery.

Volumes 1-9 of Ghost Hunt are available now.

Since then I’ve been hooked on Shirow: Appleseed, Ghost in the Shell, Dominion. Love his work. The highly detailed artwork, the reoccurring themes of technology and how it changes our relationship with the environment and what it means to be human, the incredible depth and thought he puts into crafting the world for each of his works—I can’t get enough. Nowadays, though, he almost seems to be overlooked and forgotten. Seinen isn’t “in” anymore—it’s all about the shonen, so hopefully this little guide will introduce him to some new readers. It’s the perfect time for this too, what with Dark Horse re-releasing all of his work in the unflipped and unedited format for the first time. Well, all of his work except for Ghost in the Shell and Ghost in the Shell 2:

• Black Magic M-66 (1983)
• Appleseed 1 (1985)
• Appleseed 2 (1985)
• Dominion (1986)
• Appleseed 3 (1987)
• Appleseed 4 (1989)
• Ghost in the Shell (1991)
• Orion (1991)
• Dominion: Conflict 1 (No More Noise) (1995)
• Ghost in the Shell 2: Man/Machine Interface (2001) (released in collected form in America on January 19, 2005)
• Ghost in the Shell 1.5: Human Error Processor (2003) (original version of Ghost in the Shell 2, scrapped when Ghost in the Shell 2 was collected in a single volume, but recently rereleased in Japan)

Sadly, for the past several years Shirow hasn’t been quite as active a creator as he has been in the past. Several announced books have yet to materialize, and in some cases these are projects announced in the mid 1990s such as Dominion: Conflict 2 and Appleseed 5. One can only hope.

A fantastic Shirow resource on the web is the Masamune Shirow Hyperpage. It has news and pictures on various new Shirow related products ranging from movies to toys, from art books to USB Tachikoma’s.

–Ken Haley

Appleseed

Arguably Shirow’s unfinished magnum opus, Appleseed is an epic sci-fi story following the lives of two former SWAT team members, Deunan Knute and Briarerios Hecatonchires as they find themselves trapped into the political machinations of a war-ravaged earth. Shirow’s love for speculation on how technology, humanity, and nature interact and effect each other is the focus of this four-volume series, as Deunan and Briarerios are brought to Olympus, an artificial island run by artificial people, as it attempts to over see the reconstruction and restoration of the world. Life extension treatments, clones, advanced cybernetics, solar power systems are all part of a society where all the utilities are controlled by a massive super computer in an attempt to make human interaction as environmental harmless as possible.

Appleseed has it all, plus a healthy dose of paranoia and political intrigue as not everyone is content to leave the fate of humanity in the hands of clones and a massive computer.

While it may not be as ambitious as Shirow’s work in Ghost in the Shell 2: Man/Machine Interface, it’s probably the stronger of the two works. Unlike GitS2, Appleseed manages to juggle many different balls, and keep them all in the air without one overshadowing the other. The mystery of Deunan’s father’s involvement with Olympus, the various intrigues both from within and without, the concepts of how man relates and interacts with nature through technology, they all stay afloat without becoming too dense or intricate. While readers may find themselves a bit pressed to keep everything straight, at no time should they feel completely and utterly adrift like they probably will during the last 100 pages or so of GitS2. The techonobabble never overwhelms the dialogue, and the philosophies never overwhelm the plot. It’s a nice line that Shirow manages to walk for the entirety of the series.

The series itself spans a decade and four volumes, along with two volumes’ worth of supplementary material. For ages it was the Shirow work of note, over shadowing Orion, Dominion and Black Magic. There are three movies and OVAs based upon them, with a TV series on the way. Sadly, the manga will most likely remain unfinished, as Shirow’s studio was affected by the 1995 Kobe earthquake. It was essentially destroyed and with it all the artwork and manga he was working on at the moment. All that remains of Appleseed 5 is reprinted in Appleseed: Hypernotes, and sadly it’s not that much. One can only hope that with all the renewed interest in the series due to the success of the movies that Shirow will eventually revisit the world of Appleseed and finally complete the series. Until then we can only speculate on the resolution to the various mysteries that populate the series.

–Reviewed by Ken Haley

Black Magic

Like Shirow’s more sprawling Ghost in the Shell saga, this one-volume title grapples with Big Issues: what separates men from machines? When does the right of society trump that of the individual? What do omnipotent female bioroids look like? (To no one’s surprise, the answer is “blonde and busty, with an aversion to loose fitting clothing.”)

Black Magic tells the story of an ancient Venusian civilization that rose and fell around the same time dinosaurs roamed the face of neighboring Earth. To govern their sprawling, interplanetary civilization, the Venusians engineered a supercomputer named Nemesis and a team of bioroids to carry out Nemesis’s orders. Not content with their apparatchik status, the bioroid “executors” began to chip away at Nemesis’ authority, prompting Nemesis to create a secret weapon to protect its very existence: Duna Typhon, a bioroid possessing tremendous physical and psychic powers. With an army or spiderbots and highly trained soldiers on her trail, Typhon must fight for her survival—and Nemesis’s.

I’d be the first to admit that Black Magic is not A-list Shirow. The art is, by his own admission, “old fashioned,” with dated character designs and clumsy application of tone. The story, too, feels a little aimless; after an introduction explaining the history and purpose of Nemesis, the story quickly devolves into a protracted and rather confusing battle in which we never quite get a handle on what’s at stake. The best reason to read this vintage slice of eighties sci-fi is the appendix, in which Shirow explains his rationale for casting a woman as his lead bioroid: “to provide a lower center of gravity, and to make this manga more attractive.” Couldn’t have said it better myself.

–Reviewed by Katherine Dacey

Dominion: Tank Police

Dominion is an odd creature. The first volume, Dominion: Tank Police, came out in the mid to late 1980s and was Shirow doing comedy with an awkward and unclear environmental message tacked on: a future Earth ravaged by warfare and pollution, a special branch of the police that used futuristic mini tanks on their patrols, criminal gangs involved in political protests, and a woman who was waaaaay too into her tank, all mooshed together with the usual eye for detail that comes with any of Shirow’s work.

The police are a special group assembled for the sole purpose of capturing the terrorist Buaku Gang. It’s mostly zany comedy with some occasional mentions of the massive pollution problems, and experiments with an eye towards the possibility of genetically modifying humans to survive and clean the horribly polluted air. Most of the story centers around Buaku’s various attempts to prevent this from happening, while gaining lots of money for himself along the way. Massive property damage ensues, as do crazy action sequences with tanks being chased by giant spider robots up the sides of building. Quite the nutty little piece of fiction.

Then, ten years later Shirow cranked out another Dominion book, Dominion: Conflict 1 (No More Noise). It has several of the characters from the original book, and a few of the visual concepts, yet it has nothing to do with the original at all! The pollution and environmental message that Shirow tried to work into the comedic tale are completely removed, several of the characters have gone through some heavy re-workings—most notably the main character Leona—and some have been removed completely. Leona’s gone from a slightly ditzy, yet competent tank pilot with an unhealthy obsession for her custom tank, to a much more mature and down-to-earth squad leader. The only returning villains are Anna and Una Puma, and this time they’re good guys thanks to some nebulous legal status since they’re androids. The story focuses on the investigation of criminal who’s in cahoots with a corrupt businessman and lacks a lot of the comedic punch of the original. It’s still funny, just not as funny as the first Dominion.

In both books Shirow’s love for detail in evident. The first volume contains a short essay where Shirow speculates and discusses his various ideas for tank design and the evolution of tanks within the world of Dominion, while the second contains detailed information about the internal structure of the police department, their equipment and more. The entire series is definitely one of his lightest works, and while it lacks the impact of Appleseed or Ghost in the Shell, it does manage to bring the funny and is a nice glimpse into Shirow’s sense of humor.

–Reviewed by Ken Haley

Ghost in the Shell

If Appleseed was Shirow’s magnum opus, then what the hell is Ghost in the Shell? While even Shirow has cited Appleseed as his life’s work, Ghost in the Shell is easily the most popular and well-known manga series he’s ever created. The anime was one of the key movies in popularizing anime in the US, and the subsequent TV series and movie have both had wide releases in the US (to mixed reviews). The manga, on the other hand, seems to have slipped under many people’s radar. Chances are if you mention Ghost in the Shell to your average anime/manga fan the first thing they’ll be thinking of is the movie or TV series. Odd that. But still, Ghost in the Shell has clearly become one of the seminal works from Shirow, exploring in greater depth the effect of technology upon humanity, but turning the focus inward on how it effects being a human rather than the outward examination present in things like Appleseed. The very nature of the soul, memories and other issues are all touched upon at some point within the three volumes that comprises the Ghost in the Shell saga.

The first Ghost in the Shell series focuses on Public Security Section 9 and several of their cases involving cyber terrorism, while stringing a subplot about a mysterious “Puppeteer.” At the end of the series the main character, Major Motoko Kusanagi, merges with another entity to create a new life form.

The second series, Ghost in the Shell: Man/Machine Interface switches the focus onto Kusanagi almost exclusively. It’s set years after the original one and there are next to no mentions of Section 9 or the rest of the supporting cast. Also, unlike the original that jumped between short one-offs with a lengthy subplot, Man/Machine Interface is one massive epic tale. It’s easily one of the most ambitious mangas I’ve ever come across. Almost 80% color, full of CGI graphics and effects, loaded with more technobabble than you can shake a stick at, plus a sprawling story that takes place in both the real world, cyberspace, and some deeper level of consciousness, the book is a visual treat and a heavy read. It combines Shirow’s penchant for philosophical meanderings, and speculative looks at technology, with the idea that, not only does technology effect what it means to be human but it could give birth to something completely new. Not simply a new life form as was the case in the original Ghost in the Shell, but something new and different on the spiritual level.

Ghost in the Shell 1.5: Human Error Processor is also an odd creature. Intended to be the original Ghost in the Shell 2, this series was only just released in the US last year and follows the ensemble cast of Section 9 as the investigate various cyber crimes sometime after the end of the original Ghost in the Shell. It’s an unfinished piece, as Shirow scrapped the work part way through in favor of the story we see Man Machine Interface. What this essentially means is that Human Error Processor just kind of— stops. Several short stories, some hints of a larger plot and conspiracy with echoes of the Puppet Master case, but no resolution. It’s a bit disheartening, especially since Human Error Processor, aside from the absence of the Major, is probably the work that most mirrors the popular Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex anime series.

–Reviewed by Ken Haley

Orion

Wayward sorceress Seska’s abilities to summon are no great shakes until an accident imbues her with godlike potential. Covered in divine markings, Seska finds herself an unlikely vessel in a world about to be engulfed by the karma-eating Naga dragon, who threatens the very survival of her home galaxy. Time is short, the stakes are high, and the convergence of gods, technology and magic promises the battle of the century.

Orion may be ambitious in artistic value, but when it comes to weaving a plot, this hot mess of a comic brandishes plenty of verbosity but very little substance. The whole affair can be boiled down to a rote set of events: Seska aquires divine markings. A god descends. Things blow up for hundreds of jargon laced pages. The end. Seska herself, an appropriately ambitious and hard drinking female lead, seems wasted when most of book is devoted to unrelated beat-downs and costume changes that alternate between “skimpy” and “skimpier.” Flaws, perhaps, but not enough to sink the whole affair—that honor goes to the dialogue, so laden with jargon that it approaches the unreadable.

Shirow’s world dynamics, while an attractive mix between future sci-fi and Asian mysticism, are awash in something like math, physics, and tantric Buddhism in one—the series’ so-called “psychoscience.” Characters muse about “time metrics,” “harmonics,” and “psych-element engineering,” generally in an effort to sound like something of substance is happening, but it’s difficult to tell when the words essentially mean nothing. Orion is perhaps the first manga that is ameliorated by a hearty understanding of graphing, polarity and vectors; it’s like mystic high school math class with more explosions than you can shake a stick at.

The explosions, at least, are well-rendered exercises in mushroom clouds and crumbling buildings. Shirow clearly knows how to turn a two-page spread to his advantage, employing it several times throughout the work to convey the enormity of the events. It’s a good choice, particularly as some of his smaller panels can begin to crowd with his overactive renderings of destruction and hand drawn gutters and panel lines. The future is clearly where Shirow is most at home, as his mechanical renderings demonstrate a kind of fine tuned detailing that has since become a trademark of his. The 1990s character designs are nothing of note, but the overall artistic package is an impressive one.

Orion thus seems a bit of a mixed bag; an impressive artistic sense of space still can’t quite make up for the thin stretch of plot and headache inducing amounts of in-universe language. Shirow’s notes at the back are perhaps the best indicator of this, as while they indicate a kind of detailed, fanboyish glee for his creation, they also demonstrate his inability to compact a wealth of ideas into a single volume work. For now, it remains, as Shirow says, “a little confusing.”

–Reviewed by Chloe Ferguson

The Moon and the Sandals (1996)
Truly, Kindly (1997)
Solfege (1998)
Ichigenme…the First Class is Civil Law (1998)
Lovers in the Night (1999)
Garden Dreams (1999)
Antique Bakery (1999-2002)
Gerard & Jacques (2000)
Don’t Say Anymore, Darling (2004)
Ohoku (2005)
Flower of Life (2006)
Kinō Nani Tabeta (2007)

I’m looking forward to Ohoku, a matriarchal fantasy set in feudal Japan. Ohoku was the Winner of Excellence Prize of the Manga Division at the 2006 Japan Media Arts Festival. Kino Nania Tabeta sounds like a fun return to hot guys eating delicious food.

–Erin F.

Antique Bakery (DMP)

If I were to try explaining why the Antique Bakery is so damn tasty, I’d probably express it as a recipe:

2 cups passionate dialogue
2 cups hot men
1 cup mouth-watering pastries
1/2 cup interesting clientele
1/2 cup yaoi
dash of humor
dash of melancholy

In a more analytical moment, however, I’d attribute Antique Bakery’s appeal to its characters; Yoshinaga assembles one of her most memorable casts in this four-volume work. There’s Keisuke, the bakery’s cranky owner, who was kidnapped by a cake-loving fanatic when he was a child (don’t ask—somehow it makes sense in the context of the manga); Ono, the pastry chef, former high school classmate of Keisuke, and “gay of demonic charm” (even straight men are helpless in his presence); Eiji, a cheerful young boxer who becomes Ono’s apprentice; and Chikage, a simple-minded but sweet friend of Keisuke who never, ever takes off his sunglasses.

Most of the series charts the ups and downs of Keisuke and Ono’s friendship, a friendship freighted with some serious baggage: on the last day of high school, Keisuke rudely rejected Ono’s advances, nearly breaking his spirit in the process. Yoshinaga enlivens her narrative with numerous subplots, some humorous—Chikage develops the hots for Ono—some serious—Ono must decide whether to reconcile with an abusive ex-boyfriend—and some downright delicious. Though there’s a lot of shop talk about the merits of various ingredients and the virtues of French pastries, Antique Bakery is, at heart, a slice-of-life drama about friendship. (I’d say, “male bonding,” but there isn’t much in Antique Bakery, and what little there is… well, it’s tame, even by daytime television standards.) If you’ve been wondering why so many reviewers have been singing Yoshinaga’s praises, why not start your survey with this delightful series?

–Katherine Dacey

Don’t Say Anything More, Darling (DMP)

The title is shouted at the end of the first chapter: “Don’t Say It! Don’t Say Anything More!” This bizarre short story anthology goes from fun and pleasant to weird and morbid at exactly page 72.

In the first fun short story (and my favorite), a 29-year-old “parasite single” doctor must come to terms with his feelings for his starving artist gay best friend from high school. Meanwhile, the doctor’s parents attempt to arrange a marriage. It’s cute and fun, with some sexy sex scenes.

The second story, “My Eternal Sweetheart” starts off fun: a rich orphan with a severe immune problem is confined to his mansion. Fortunately, he lives in an android-rich future, where his brother designs sexaroids to keep the lonely teen company. It’s pretty imaginative, although more than a little weird, but the story goes horribly wrong at page 72 when the boy starts killing the sexaroids! Brace yourself for a serious “WTF” twist ending.

The remaining shorts get weirder and more depressing: In “One May Day” a widower professor takes a second wife, but after one terribly faux pas they break up. In “Fairyland” a youth counselor thinks he’s the last person on earth until he meets the bullied teen who wished (successfully) for everyone in the world to die. In “Pianist,” a former pro piano player (who happens to be homosexual) considers suicide.

The story about the pianist has me really worried about the rules of yaoi. A younger man is about to sleep with the pianist when he suddenly freaks out:

“If you want to be the bottom at your age, then find yourself another old geezer like you, man! But if you’re still thinking, ‘Oh I wanna be held in the arms of a pretty young boy,’ then – I suggest you PAY for one.”

Does this imply the prettier, younger partner is always the uke? Do only ukes get cuddled? I think everyone needs cuddling sometimes!

I can see some patterns coming up in Yoshinaga’s work. “My Eternal Sweetheart” features the same three-year age gap as Gerard and Jacques, as well as a fantasy premise. “One May Day” reminded me a bit of Garden Dreams.

I loaned this volume to a friend, and she concluded the shorter Yoshinaga’s works, the weirder they are. I really, really enjoyed the title story, “Don’t Say Anything More, Darling,” and I wish it were an entire series. Everything else in the book is downright unsettling. Nevertheless, Yoshinaga is a more accomplished storyteller here than in Solfege or Garden Dreams.

–Erin F.

Flower of Life (DMP)

I had a hard time getting into Antique Bakery and took a break between volumes two and three, but with Flower of Life I read each new volume immediately and with fannish rigor. I keep recommending it to people, including guys, but I have a hard time convincing them there’s no yaoi involved. Two of the characters are otaku, so as with Genshiken, I’m showing favoritism towards otaku-centric titles. I can’t explain what the title means, except as a reference to the protagonist, who struggled with cancer but enters high school healthy and filled with the enthusiasm of youth. This is a title about happiness.

–Erin F.

Fumi Yoshinaga’s geek-centric comedy focuses on a group of teens who invite their new classmate to join the manga club. Not much actually happens in Flower of Life; most chapters consist of passionate conversations between club members about—what else?—manga. Yoshinaga has a wonderful time poking fun at otakudom (including her usual bailiwick, boy’s love) while respecting the intensity and sincerity of her characters’ feelings. The result is both moving and laugh-out-loud funny. You’ve never seen a cultural festival storyline quite like the one in volume two—trust me on this one.

–Katherine Dacey

Garden Dreams (DMP)

Garden Dreams is an odd, unsatisfying collection of stories about a handsome musician who, courtesy of the Crusades, finds himself living in a foreign country with a kind but handsome nobleman who’s several decades his senior. Most of the book is devoted to a rather convoluted story in which the nobleman’s tragic past is revealed; like Gerard (of Gerard and Jacques fame), the baron has an unhappy marriage in his past that has predisposed him to prefer male companionship.

Anyone hoping for a good helping of smut will be sorely disappointed by Garden Dreams, as Yoshinaga never turns up the heat beyond a mild simmer—there’s far more explicit homoeroticism in, say, Tokyo Babylon. Readers who favor Yoshinaga’s engaging talkfests over her boudoir tales will also be disappointed in Garden Dreams, as the characters never rise beyond the level of type; their conversations are rather banal and uninteresting, as is the unnecessarily twisty story that the nobleman relates. The artwork, like the plot and characters, doesn’t make much of an impression. Yoshinaga does little to situate her story in a specific time or place, save for a few concessions to period costume and instruments. (She earns a solid A in organology from this musicologist in training.) The sameness of her character designs is especially evident in the characters’ profiles and jawlines; the men and women would be interchangeable if not for their costumes.

It’s true that second- or third-rate Yoshinaga is still better than the majority of licensed manga on bookstore shelves, but when compared with her best work, Garden Dreams seems average at best.

–Katherine Dacey

Gerard and Jacques (BLU Manga)

Gerard and Jacques is a two-volume yaoi romance set in France just prior to the French Revolution. Jacques is sold into prostitution at age sixteen by his aristocrat parents. Gerard is a commoner who has made it big selling romance novels; he is Jacques’ first and only client at the whorehouse. The next day, by coincidence, Jacques is hired as a servant in Gerard’s mansion. Their formerly intimate relationship turns platonic until volume two, which is set three years later.

I was mislead by the Overlooked Manga Festival and assumed Gerard and Jacques was all sex scenes interrupted by political and economic lectures. Instead, the two books more closely follow the format of Moon and Sandals: volume one is mostly plot and volume two has more sex. However, the opening sex scene in volume one is surprisingly graphic, I mean, a sixteen-year-old is sodomized in the first twenty pages! I started the book on the subway, but opted to read the rest of the series at home!

The plot unfolds in four major sections. In the first quarter Jacques learns how to be a servant, leaving behind his aristocratic life. In the second quarter, we are given a jumble of flashbacks to Gerard’s past—he hates aristocrats and sleeps exclusively with young boys because his ex-wife was a huge aristocratic jerk. In the third quarter, Jacques’s pent-up sexual desire causes him to blow up in cartoon-y explosions until he learns to masturbate. The fourth quarter follows Gerard and Jacques as they struggle to survive the Reign of Terror.

The art is as accomplished as Antique Bakery. Gerard’s design is particularly dashing, with his eye-patch and scar. Characters’ costumes are detailed and work quite well. Backgrounds are a bit lacking, especially in volume one. Pre-revolution era France as a setting calls for lush post-Rococo interiors, but we’re lucky if Yoshinaga draws a decent fireplace.

A story set in this time period in France ought to be rife with scandalous sex, but Yoshinaga is no Marquis De Sade. More scandalous than Gerard’s deviant sex life is the attitude of his ex-wife toward her child. True love is valued more deeply in the story than deviant sex. The villainous members of the aristocracy appear incapable of love, and are given due punishment.

Although the plot structure is uneven, overall I was amused by the series. It lacks the personal moments of Flower of Life or Moon and Sandals in favor of fantasy-history. Gerard and Jacques is more compelling and coherent than Garden Dreams or Don’t Say Anything More Darling. I recommend it for its high amusement factor as well as the explicit sex.

–Erin F.

Ichigenme: The First Class is Civil Law (801 Media)

One of the things that distinguishes Fumi Yoshinaga’s work from that of other yaoi artists is her love of dialogue. In works like Antique Bakery and Flower of Life, she reminds us that conversation can be an aphrodisiac, especially when two people are analyzing a favorite book or confessing a mutually-shared passion for art, cooking, or manga, forging a connection and establishing the roles they’ll play (dominant or submissive) in the subsequent relationship. True to form, the sexiest scenes in Ichigenme: The First Class Is Civil law are, in fact, conversations between law professors and their students. We feel the erotic charge of more experienced scholars engaging their protégés in intense debates over legal procedure and philosophy, even when the topics themselves are rather dry.

Unfortunately, this kind of intensity doesn’t carry over to the other scenes of this two-volume series. Yes, there’s plenty of bedroom action as the carefree Tohdou helps his uptight, closeted classmate Tamiya explore his sexuality, while Tohdou’s brother—also gay—seduces a semi-closeted member of the law school’s faculty, but it’s all rather formulaic. Yoshinaga is enough of a storyteller to make these scenes an integral part of Tamiya’s self-discovery process, rather than simple exercises in titillation, but the story still wants for more dramatic tension; all that talking, while interesting and maybe even sexy, never really leads anywhere.

–Katherine Dacey

Lovers in the Night and Truly, Kindly (BLU Manga)

Truly, Kindly is an is an anthology of seven stories, from a coming-out tale set in present-day Seattle to a going-straight (as in abandoning a criminal past… ahem) story set in Meiji-era Japan, while the stories in Lovers in the Night focus on two characters introduced in the final chapter of Truly, Kindly. (A butler with an eye patch and a young nobleman who likes to pout… are you beginning to see a pattern here?) Despite the diverse array of historical backdrops and storylines, Truly, Kindly induces déjà vu with its recycled character designs, clumsy socio-political lectures masquerading as conversation, and the “I didn’t realize how much I liked you until you forced yourself on me!” epiphanies that her uke characters experience. The last three stories—all of which take place in the years leading up to the French Revolution—exhibit another of Yoshinaga’s shortcomings: her inability to integrate tidbits on Versailles and Voltaire into a narrative without stopping it dead in its tracks. Though utterly forgettable, Lovers in the Night earns higher marks than Truly, Kindly for emphasizing steamy encounters between beautiful men in period costume over long-winded political discussions.

Still, there’s something endearing about Yoshinaga’s insistence on creating characters with real emotional lives and realistically handsome faces in a genre known primarily for its man-on-man action—it’s as if someone forgot to tell her she was writing porn, for pete’s sake.

–Reviewed by Katherine Dacey

The Moon and Sandals (DMP)

Fumi Yoshinaga is the darling of the manga blogging world. Jason Thompson likes her, Shaenon Garrity likes her, and even Katherine, who doesn’t read much yaoi, likes her. So how does The Moon and Sandals compare with her other work: is it better than Antique Bakery? Not really. Is it as charming as The Flower of Life? Not exactly. Is there a lot of explicit gay sex? Why, yes there is!

There are five major characters. Kobayashi is a high school kid who falls for his world history teacher, a young man named Mr. Ida. Out of a naive bravery, Kobayashi goes to Mr. Ida’s house to make a move on him, only to be interrupted by Hashizume, Ida’s lover, who announces that he has quit his job to come live with Ida. Kobayashi runs out of the house, embarrassed. On the rebound, Kobayashi starts to fall for Toyo Narumi, a blonde boy nicknamed “Giant.” Giant hasn’t come to grips with being gay just yet. To complicate matters further, Giant’s little sister Naru has a crush on Kobayashi.

The Moon and Sandals gets a higher score from me for dealing with gay issues in a refreshing, realistic way. Hashizume must adopt Ida as his brother so landlords will rent to them. Kobayashi is not sure how to perform gay sex and buys a book from Ni-chome (Tokyo’s gay district) so he can do it with his boyfriend. Giant hurt a boy he liked in junior high just to prove to his classmates that he wasn’t gay. Characters discuss coming out to their coworkers and families. Even when Yoshinaga’s characters are standing outdoors dramatically in a typhoon and sustaining blood-drawing injuries while confessing their love, there is a certain honesty to her characterizations. Moments that would be melodramatic elsewhere are somehow believable here.

I only have a few hesitations about The Moon and Sandals. Ida and Hashizume get un-officially married before they have sex, but after they’ve been living together for months. It seems unrealistic in a yaoi title with realistic elements. Darker-haired characters fall for lighter haired characters as per strict yaoi genre conventions. Yoshinaga’s character designs are all similar. That said, if you like Fumi Yoshinaga, or yaoi, or both, I think you’ll like The Moon and Sandals.

–Erin F.

Solfege (DMP)

In this one-shot boy’s love romance, Kugayama, an elementary school music teacher, falls for Tanaka. Tanaka is a junior high student whom Kugayama is tutoring get into a music-focused high school. “Solfege” as defined in the book, is the study of music, specifically transcribing music by ear and singing. Tanaka begins showing signs of delinquency, skipping school and skipping music lessons. Due to a turbulent home life, Tanaka relies more and more on Kugayama for emotional support. Even after getting in to his music high school of choice, Tanaka comes to Kugayama for a place to stay when his nightclub hostess mother has men spend the night. Tanaka lives with Kugayama for a year while his mother is hospitalized.

The story focuses on Kugayama as he takes advantage of Tanaka’s desperation and neediness. Kugayama knows his relationship with Tanaka is morally wrong. However, as the become live-in lovers, the elementary school choir improves, and Kugayama realizes his quality of life has gone up with love.

The backgrounds are sketchy to the point of being non-existent at times. Flipping back through the book again I can almost forgive the white backgrounds for Yoshinaga’s expressive linework. The character designs are typical of Yoshinaga’s work: a light-haired teacher takes advantage of a naive tall brunette. (It’s always a naive tall brunette.) I was particularly enamored of Tsumoir’s hair (the only girl character) early in the book, but at the end she’s got a ridiculous perm.

Instead of dwelling on the forbidden-ness of the relationship, Yoshinaga sketches interpersonal moments in a very long term on-again off-again relationship. The jumps in time over eight years are a bit overwhelming, if not unbelievable. The story begins in an ordinary place—Tanaka is not a particularly talented singer, Kugayama is not an extraordinary teacher. Things take a turn for the fantastic as Tanaka becomes a famous singer in Italy and Kugayama is violently attacked by an ex-lover. Fortunately (or perhaps ridiculously) Yoshinaga does not seem capable of writing a truly tragic ending.

Compared to other Yoshinaga books, the characters in Solfege eat fewer delicious foods (there is one hotpot scene). It’s missing the humor of Flower of Dreams and it’s not as bizarre as Garden Dreams and not as sexy as The Moon and Sandals. Nevertheless, Solfege is an amusing one-shot. It’s a very middle-of-the-road work for Yoshinaga, but a very satisfying read compared to other BL one-shots.

–Erin F.

The Kare Kano manga was serialized in Lala magazine from 1995 to 2005. The graphic novels were published in the U.S. by Tokyopop from 2003 up to the last volume, released in January of 2007. The anime aired in Japan in 1998 and came out on DVD in America in 2002.

For the uninitiated, Kare Kano (full title “Kareshi Kanojo no Jijou” or “His and Her Circumstances”) is a high school love story—although it’s far from fluffy shojo. Yukino and Soichiro hold the highest grades in their class, and Yukino, obsessed with her image, sets Soichiro in her sites as her archenemy. The pair fall in love, but the story doesn’t end there. The author, Masami Tsuda, explores the inner lives of Yukino and Soichiro, and we learn why both characters have a deep need to over-achieve in the classroom, rooted in their family histories and childhood, and how the two characters change each other on a deep level by dating.

Tsuda doesn’t stop there. She builds the world of Yukino and Soichiro’s high school experience, fleshing out their group of friends and even a few background characters. Every character has a backstory, a love story, dreams and ambitions, and all the wants and needs on Maslow’s hierarchy. Somehow the use of pictures maps out the heart of each character in a way that a prose novel could not.

At its best, Kare Kano is touching and brilliant, and the characters seem very real and very human. “Kare Kano is the bible of my heart!” one young fan writes in the last volume. Unfortunately, the series is inconsistent. At its worst, Kare Kano is over-the-top and melodramatic. At times, the characters who seemed so real one volume prior are suddenly fantastic soap opera characters, like something out of Dallas.

At its worst, Kare Kano raises some troubling questions. Although it tells a very touching story of love, it is an idealized story of high school life. For example, no one turns out to be gay. No one breaks up and recovers from their broken heart. All of the couples who get together in the first 20 volumes are still together 16 years later at the end of volume 21. No one broke up in college? No one got divorced? Only one character is not paired off with a significant other—the girl who is an author of award winning novels in high school. Could that character be representative of Tsuda herself, who I suspect is unmarried?

Sometimes the art of Kare Kano is amazing, but more than one volume has multiple two-page spreads of clouds and text—or even the occasional nearly-blank page. At times, reading Kare Kano is like watching a really smart kid sleep through class. It is painfully wasted potential. It is the flashes of brilliance that keep readers coming back and makes them fanatically devoted to this series. I am not immune to this fanaticism.

I first encountered Kare Kano as anime in 1999. A webcomic I was reading made the fansubs available as RealMedia files. Up to that point I was a fan of Sailor Moon, but not a real hardcore fan of manga or anime. Downloading Kare Kano and seeking out the rest of the series was the beginning of my fandom. It was like falling down the rabbit hole.

Eight years later, the final volume of the Kare Kano manga has finally been released. The anime series left off mid-story-arc, and I have been waiting eight years to read the ending of this story. Anything would be better than the anime’s non-ending… or so I thought.

Volume 21 has broken my mind. I made the following comic about it:

Click for full view (vague spoilers)

Weirdly enough, despite being metaphorically knifed in the face, I still love Kare Kano. Maybe it’s Stockholm syndrome.

I have reviewed volume 21 below, but if you haven’t finished reading the book it is filled with major spoilers.

If you are interested in reading the Kare Kano manga in order to feel closure from the anime (and not just the manga for manga’s sake), I have provided a handy guide below. It is not actually necessary to buy all 21 volumes just to find out what happens to Soichiro and Yukino—however, some volumes are so intense that you’ll need to buy them two or three at a time.

Volume #: 21

In Brief: Asaba hooks up with some faceless inconsequential girl. Yukino tells her friends she’s pregnant. High school graduation happens and the group of friends (most of whom we haven’t seen since volume 12 anyway) part ways. Then we get a look into 16 years in the future. Yukino is a doctor with three kids and Soichiro is a detective. Asaba is a successful artist who lives next door. The band Yin and Yang play at the Budokan and the high school friends briefly reunite.

My Review: The last few pages of this book really are beautiful and wonderful. But it’s too late—the screaming in my head won’t stop. There is something unholy and awful in this volume, at least by American standards.

In the beginning of the book, Asaba is being all emo, saying he’ll never find his soul mate. It has long been hinted at throughout the series that if Soichiro were a chick, he would marry Asaba, his best friend. However, Asaba is not gay (in netspeak: gay for Soichiro?) and he can’t be with Soichiro. The way to resolve this is not the way that mangaka Tsuda has chosen.

Yukino announces to Asaba that she is pregnant. The following dialog takes place:

Asaba: A girl who looks like Soichiro-kun! I’d love to hold her in my arms!
Yukino: We don’t know if it’s a boy or a girl yet.
Asaba: Well—I do. It’s a girl.

On the next page Asaba thinks, “She’s the one I’ve waited for. This baby will grow up to be my soul mate!”

At that point my mind broke. A voice in my head started screaming and didn’t stop until the end of the book. I knew what was going to happen.

A little more than halfway through the book we flash forward to 16 years in the future. Soichiro is a workaholic detective and Yukino is, for some reason, a mediocre plastic surgeon.

Asaba is a successful artist (implausibly so) who lives next door. He has helped raise Yukino’s children from birth, almost like a stay-at-home dad. The eldest child is, indeed, a beautiful girl who looks like Soichiro. The younger kids are fraternal brothers who don’t act like actual brothers (as per manga conventions where many siblings seem hot for each other in inappropriate ways).

In many manga and anime series, there is an emphasis on genetics, and Kare Kano is no exception. For example, in Hikaru No Go, Hikaru’s grandfather was an award winning Go player. It’s an aside to the story, but it is important to the Japanese to let us know that Hikaru comes from a bloodline of winning Go players. In the beginning of Kare Kano Yukino is a super-smart overachiever because she studies very hard in order to be number one. Yukino’s parents are middle class and average. Soichiro Arima comes from a long line of brilliant doctors and has inherited this brilliance. It is apparent by the end of the series that Soichiro is truly brilliant but Yukino was not—she was “faking it” by working hard. Her daughter can be brilliant only because the child “takes after Soichiro.” Yukino’s twin boys are more average, because they “take after Yukino.” It is difficult to convey how angry that makes me. Maybe I have the American sensibility that anyone can achieve greatness if they work really hard at it, no matter who one’s parents are.

Soichiro’s daughter, Sakura, confesses her love to Asaba just before her high school entrance ceremony. And he doesn’t reject her. They even hold hands at the end.

Let’s do the math: if Asaba was 18 when he graduated and Sakura was born the next year, that means he is about 35, and Sakura, beginning high school in tenth grade, Japanese-style, is 15 or 16 years old. In the U.S., their relationship is illegal.

I could accept Maho’s 27-year-old dentist boyfriend because her boyfriend knew it was wrong. Asaba thinks this is not only right—it’s destiny. I might be more accepting if Asaba hadn’t helped raise Sakura from birth like a father.

“Hey baby, I used to change your diapers, but now you’re totally hot!”

It’s totally ridiculous.

Volume 8

In Brief: This volume touches on the very end of the Kare Kano anime. Tonami (the kid who used to be fat) and Tsubaki (the volleyball chick) dance around each other in the chaotic beginning of their relationship. Soichiro realizes he has a dark side. Nearly half of the book is dedicated to throw-away characters Kazune and Komako.

My Review: This is a really irritating and weak volume of Kare Kano. I couldn’t bring myself to care all that much about Tonami and Tsubaki, since the “Dark Arima” arc is beginning in the background of their story. Unfortunately, the “Dark Arima” story is left hanging about two-thirds of the way through this book and doesn’t pick up again until Volume 13. That’s five entire books later!

The sixty-two page story of Kazune and Komako comes off as an annoying digression from the main plot. I had absolutely no time for Kazune and his bizarre relationship with his childhood friend Komako. Kazune was always a sickly young child, but grew up to be a loud obnoxious asshole. He’s in love with Komako but can’t see to show it in a way that isn’t annoying. Maybe it’s just a cultural difference, but I couldn’t bring myself to cheer on this couple at all. I desperately hoped that Kazune and Komako wouldn’t get together.

Volume 9

In Brief: The girls perform the play “Steel Snow” at the cultural festival. Tsubaki (the volleyball chick) and Tonami’s love story comes to a sort of conclusion. The book ends on a cliffhanger as Yukino tells Soichiro she’s no longer trying to be number one. This cliffhanger is not touched upon again for several books, but it’s very important later.

My Review: The “Steel Snow” play, which was not shown in the TV series, is pretty wacky. It’s a sci-fi stageplay, which doesn’t happen very often in American schools, and as you read it you can kind of see why. It really seems as if it was written by a high school student.

I don’t really care that much about Tsubaki and Tonami’s relationship, although I’m glad to see it reach some kind of conclusion here. The climactic scene between the two of them comes off as somewhat confusing. Are they going out or not? Why can’t they just say “So I guess we’re a couple now”?

A few very important things transpire between Soichiro and Yukino, so you have to read this volume. Unlike later volumes, it’s also packed with side stories and isn’t lacking in the art department.

Volume 10

In Brief: The first third of the book gives us the backstory of how Maho met her much older (27), dentist boyfriend Takashi. The second third is the story of the school trip to Kyoto, and all the characters are included. The final third is “Chapter Zero,” a prequel chapter that tells the story of Yukino and Soichiro taking the high school entrance exam back when they were in junior high.

My Review: Maho’s story is alarming and kind of disturbing. Why would a 27-year-old date a ninth grader? Takashi, the dentist in question, is disturbed by it himself. He doesn’t do anything physical with Maho and refuses to go out with her for quite some time, but Maho is persistent. I’m 27 myself, and I can’t imagine befriending a 14-year-old. I guess if you take the story as pure fantasy, it’s believable. When I was 14, I probably would have liked to meet older guys—although we’re talking college guys and not post-college guys.

The story about the class trip to Kyoto is well done, and makes it worth picking up this volume. It has no real bearing on any of the story arcs, and is just a cute stand-alone story. One gets to learn what Japanese people do when they travel though Japan—they must eat the local specialty dish at every place they visit.

“Chapter Zero” I could take or leave. Sure, it’s cute to see the characters in their junior high uniforms, but by this point in the book you kind of want to get back to the main story.

Volume 11

In Brief: Tsubasa is obviously in love with her step-brother, Kazuma. Kazuma’s rock band Yin and Yang, is starting to become famous. As Kazuma slowly falls for Tsubasa, he realizes he has to make some hard choices about music, school, and Tsubasa.

My Review: This volume is very beautifully done. Kazuma is standing on emotional crossroads and that come through very well in the art and writing. His love for Tsubasa starts off as innocent and grows into a romantic love. At one point, a member of Kasuma’s band says:

No man can stay innocent forever. Someday, Kazuma will have to face reality. When he realizes he has less innocent urges within him too, the songs he sings will change. And the band will be the thing to benefit the most.

Somewhere in the middle of the book Kazuma realizes he should probably quit school so the band can go on tour. The band encourages him to graduate, and they agree to tour during the upcoming summer break. By the end of the book, Kazuma realizes that his love for Tsubasa is romantic and sexual, and he can no longer live in his parents’ house.

Soichiro and Yukino appear only very briefly in this volume.

Volume 12

In Brief: Kazuma’s band becomes ridiculously successful, but Tsubasa feels hurt and emotionally abandoned. This book ends the Tsubasa/Kazuma story. The final chapter is a side-story focusing on Rika, a minor character.

My Review: Kazuma’s band becomes ridiculously successful very fast in a way that just isn’t believable. The band members all get along very well, and are not plagued by the problems of actual rock bands that I’ve known. If you look at it as pure fantasy, it’s fun to read, but if you are looking for the realities of high school or being in a band, forget about it.

Tsubasa is overwhelmed by Kazuma’s success and is worried that she’s been abandoned by the boy she loves. When Yin and Yang’s next album is titled “Tsubasa,” she stops wallowing in self-pity and realizes that Kazuma loves her so much that all the songs she’s been avoiding are actually about her. The Kazuma/Tsubasa arc ends the same way as the film Whispers of the Heart, and it comes off as being just as unlikely and kind of jarring as it does in the movie.

The final chapter is about Rika, who is Aya’s (the best-selling author’s) sidekick and best friend. Rika is not a very spectacular character like the rest of the cast of Kare Kano, but she is a very good cook. It turns out Rika is in love with Kyo, who is Aya’s older brother and Rika’s childhood friend. It’s a sweet little story.

This volume is so sweet and nice! It really doesn’t prepare you for the dark stories in later volumes…

Volume 13

In Brief: The Dark Arima arc picks up as Soichiro gets number one in the country on a mock college entrance exam. He’s also chosen to appear on television because of his success in kendo. All of this attention means that Soichiro’s family has taken notice, including his cruel cousins as well as someone else from his past.

My Review: Throughout this book, we see another side of Soichiro that was only hinted at in the anime series. Soichiro reveals (to the reader) that he has worked hard to be number one in everything for the sole purpose of getting revenge on his mean cousins and extended family. There is something he can’t tell Yukino.

In a very bittersweet couple of pages Soichiro and Yukino skip school together. Yukino wants to become a lawyer and Soichiro wants to be a doctor, so they realize their time together as high school students is short before they go on to law school and medical school. That’s one thing that really gets to me about Kare Kano, and high school relationships in general. How feasible are high school couples in the long term, particularly if the students involved go to separate colleges? I knew lots of guys in college who ended up breaking up with their high school sweethearts in the freshmen or sophomore year in college.

Soichiro knows that he and Yukino are headed down separate paths. This is a really suspenseful volume with a cliffhanger, so if you’re going to buy it, you need to buy the next several books all at once.

Volume 14

In Brief: Soichiro’s birth mother shows up and wants Soichiro back in her life. Soichiro doesn’t tell anyone he’s been meeting with her, not even Yukino, or his birth parents. Yukino realizes Soichiro is lying to her—and worse, that their relationship changed (back in volume 9) in an important way that she missed.

My Review: Soichiro’s birth mother is seriously creepy in this volume. She’s very beautiful, and used to living the high life. She buys Soichiro fancy clothes to wear just to take him out to eat at an expensive restaurant. For whatever reason, Soichiro doesn’t say no to her, even though she kisses him in a way that seems horribly uncomfortable.

Soichiro lies to Yukino, saying his mother is simply someone from his past. Yukino freaks out and remembers back to volume 9 when she told Soichiro that she was giving up on being number one. That actually hurt Soichiro in a way that she didn’t notice at the time, to the point where they had practically broken up emotionally, without actually breaking up as a couple. Yukino has to get to the bottom of this problem.

On page 180 Soichiro’s heart bursts. Not in a literal way, but some emotions that he’d been keeping locked up have suddenly broken lose, and forgotten memories are coming to the surface in time for volume 15.

Volume 14 is a gripping read that’s hard to put down. It feels as if the series is back on track, and all the side-tracking filler arcs and minor characters’ backstories have gone away. You’ll want to read volumes 13-16 when you have a lot of time on your hands, because you’ll need to read them all at once.

Volume 15

In Brief: Soichiro’s repressed memories of his life with his abusive birth mother come flooding back to him. Yukino and Soichiro’s adopted parents find out and are understandably concerned. Soichiro stabs his hand with a box cutter and breaks up with Yukino.

My Review: I normally don’t read manga during lunch, but when I read the first part of this volume on my morning commute, I couldn’t wait until lunch so I could find someplace quiet to read the rest of the book.

This volume is really intense. Soichiro’s birth mother was abusive to him to the point of melodrama—leaving him alone for days at a time, beating him with scissors—it gets really gross and very disturbing at times. It’s no wonder that Soichiro is going insane as the memories flood back to him.

Soichiro wonders the streets alone and night, doesn’t sleep for days, and eventually crashes at Asaba’s apartment. Yukino will not leave Soichiro alone, not even when he breaks up with her! Soichiro is angry at Yukino for opening up his Pandora’s box of memories.

The thing that’s really well done about this volume (and it happens elsewhere in the series, too) is the way that emotions are shown in abstract images. On some pages, Soichiro is a tiny three-year-old child in a field of thorns, and Yukino appears to save him in an angelic scene.

Volume 15 is so intense that the author’s notes in the margin seem grating and inane. In one of the most tense scenes of childhood abuse, Tsuda’s author’s note in the margin says, “My favorite snacks: I like cracker-type biscuits. They’re crunchy and sweet and salty and delicious!” Meanwhile 3-year-old Soichiro’s blood is spreading across the floor. This kind of contrast was tough to read through—it made me angry at the author for being so inane with one hand while torturing her characters with the other hand.

After volume 15, you can take a break, but this arc doesn’t finish up until the end of volume 16.

Volume 16

In Brief: This volume opens with a flashback to Soichiro’s post-adopted life, and some pleasant memories of life with his new family. Then there’s a long section of Soichiro and Yukino putting their relationship back together. Soichiro’s birth mother keeps showing up at the high school, but together, he and his friends find ways to thwart her.

My Review: You’re going to have to buy this and read it after reading volume 15, but that said, this volume is a little disappointing in terms of art. Sure, there are some gorgeous illustrations and character drawings, but there are also several pages which are totally blank except for a few words. Page 61 only has the word “Yes�” on it, and an ellipsis, just like that! Four pages later is another all-white page with four words on it. The rest of the volume is scattered pages that only have two panels with one character’s face in one panel and a few word balloons and some toner in the other panel. It’s like the shojo equivalent of Frank Miller splash pages. It feels as if the author and her staff went all out for the last book and took a sabbatical during this volume.

Not a whole lot actually happens in this volume, but you need it as an emotional recovery from the previous volume. Some of the scenes of Soichiro’s friends helping him avoid his birth mother are genuinely funny.

After volume 16, you can take a long break before starting volume 17, since it begins a new story arc.

Volume 17

In Brief: Yukino goes with Soichiro and his family to their vacation home for winter break. It’s there that Soichiro has a flashback about his birth father, Reiji, and we learn more about Reiji from Soichiro’s adopted father. Meanwhile Kazuma, Tsubasa, Maho, and Takashi go to a concert of a cult jazz pianist in New York City—whose name just happens to be Reiji Arima. Reiji eventually meets his son on a trip to Japan, where he abducts him via motorcycle.

My Review: This might very well pinpoint the moment the series goes downhill. Sure, you’ll want to keep reading to know how it ends, but you’re going to be disappointed.

The implausibly levels of Kare Kano go through the roof at this point. Is there no one in this series who’s just a casual musician? First we had to buy that Kazuma is an insanely talented singer, and now we have to believe that Soichiro’s birth father, Reiji, is a cult jazz pianist who’s music really touches people’s hearts. In the scene where Maho, Takashi, Tsubasa, and Kazuma are at Reiji’s concert, Kazuma starts singing along to Reiji’s music without thinking about it! Sure, Kazuma is a great singer, but they’re at a fancy concert hall, not a rock show! If something like that happened in real life I’d be embarrassed for Kazuma!

Before that, we’re suppose to believe that Soichiro actually met his real dad back when he was four or five years old shortly after he started living with his birth parents. Unlike the flashbacks in volume 15, this doesn’t seem plausible or real at all. It’s an unnecessary scene.

Reiji is a ridiculous person. He abducts Soichiro at gunpoint (although it’s a toy gun) and whisks him away on a motorcycle. Why Soichiro would agree to this after his previous adventures with his birth mother, I have no idea.

The biggest bombshell in this book, though, is on page 78 when Yukino admits (to the reader) that she hasn’t had a period in two months. She might be pregnant, she thinks, although she doesn’t want to worry Soichiro with that news. That scene made me pull my hair out for days! Pregnancy scares are, well—scary! Yukino doesn’t seem very concerned about it, she even seems kind of happy. Hello?! What about law school? What about college? What about prenatal vitamins like folic acid? Yukino is not showing the level of concern I’d expect from a pregnant teenager.

That page was a total shock to me, but as I’ve looked back through the previous volume for this review, I’ve found other foreshadowing. I hope she’s not really pregnant. There’s nothing wrong with wanting to be a housewife, but I think Yukino should at least go to college.

Volume 18

In Brief: Soichiro and Yukino spend time with Soichiro’s father, Reji. Soichiro’s surrogate father, Soji, tells the tumultuous story of how he raised Reji after Reji was rejected as a bastard child in his family’s clan.

My Review: Reji’s backstory is tragic—epically tragic. His mother tried to drown herself and a three-year-old Reji, but Reji claws his way free and survives. Reji is rejected by his father’s rich clan because he is a bastard son born from an affair. Only Soji, who is infertile and Reji’s much older half-brother, will take the boy in. Soji and Reji have a very dramatic falling out. Much of the problems in the Arima clan are thanks to Reji’s father, a talented and handsome monster of a man who does not love his children—except maybe Reji.

The story at this point borders on melodrama. It is what I imagine gothic tales of twisted family trees are like—if I read those kind of books—but I don’t. The author has long ago done away with plausibility and reality, but in a strange way this volume is more believable than other parts of the series. Families really can have twisted pasts and long lines of abusive fathers. Volume 18 is weirdly more believable than a rock band playing a top 40 hit in volume 12.

Volume 19

In Brief: We get the story of Soichiro’s conception and consequent adoption. Yukino is afraid to tell Soichiro that she’s pregnant.

My Review: In case you were wondering how Soichiro’s birth parents hooked up, it’s in this volume, and it’s really sick and weird. Soichiro’s mother was a bad-girl, juvenile delinquent type, who spread a rumor around her high school that she was sleeping with Reji which wasn’t even true. Her real boyfriend beats the crap out of Reji and lands him in the hospital, where Soichiro’s mother essentially rapes him in order to get pregnant.

Later Reji doesn’t even remember sleeping with her. He abandons young Soichiro and moves to New York. Soichiro’s mother’s plan was to milk money off Reji’s rich family. Her plan fails, since no one in the family liked Reji anyway, and she’s obviously a gold-digger. She never intended to be a real mother and hates her child. Soji doesn’t find out that young Soichiro is being horribly abused until he almost dies.

The volume ends with the worst scene in the series so far. Back in the present, Soichiro’s birth mother turns up again and confronts Reji. Reji shoots her, and the last line in the book is: “I came to Japan—to kill her.”

The melodrama!

Volume 20

In Brief: Soichiro stops his father from shooting his mother. Reji makes peace with Soji and leaves town. We get Soji’s wife’s backstory. Yukino tells Soichiro she’s pregnant and he proposes to her. The couple tells their parents.

My Review: The opening scene is wholly ridiculous and unbelievable. The bloodsplatters that closed out volume 19 were from the bullet just barely grazing Soichiro’s mother’s ear. Soichiro won’t let Reji shoot her (even though she deserves it). It’s not clear if murder was actually Reji’s intent, but it is clear that extreme measures were needed to ensure that Soichiro’s mother never returns.

The struggle with the gun is totally out-of-place in a series like this, and it’s not well drawn.

Reading Soji’s wife’s backstory the chapter after that is a relief, but it’s also kind of a slap in the face so late in the story. There is only a volume and a half left to cover the pregnancy issue.

Speaking of which, Yukino’s mother guesses that she’s pregnant before she tells Soichiro. Her mother is cool with it since she got pregnant young too. Unfortunately I’m not nearly so calm about it as Yukino or her mother.

Kare Kano is manga, it is fantasy, it is from another culture with different cultural attitudes towards pregnancy, motherhood, college, and careers. Yukino is marrying into a rich family and will still complete her college degree—but this is so far from the reality I’ve experienced. The girls I know who got pregnant in high school were not as lucky as Yukino. Certainly none of them were rich.

While my head was still spinning from this twist I was hit with another: on page 175 the author pulls a total ret-con bullshit move. Apparently Yukino once found Soichiro’s secret stash of detective videos and books. Soichiro actually wants to be a cop! He doesn’t need to go to college at all!

At this point I’m calling shenanigans on the author, Masami Tsuda. Damnit Tsuda! You couldn’t have planted that love of detectives earlier in the series?! If I didn’t love books so much I would have thrown volume 20 across the room. I may have thrown it and since forgotten my blind fury of rage.

Yukino asks to use Soichiro’s college fund to go to medical school herself (!?) after doing some time as a housewife. Fair enough! I’d believe anything at this point! Soichiro wants to be a detective! Pigs can fly! Whatever!