I need to stop apologizing for making so many of these review posts and just own them. I have a lot to review so we might as well get started. Some of these are late being posted to my blog due to being busy elsewhere at work but I did get them up on NetGalley in time. This one is particularly long because I had a lot to review and, for several books, had a lot of thoughts.
I received free review copies from NetGalley in exchange for a fair review.
Title: I'm the Grim Reaper, Vol. 1
Author/Illustrator: GRAVEWEAVER
Rating: 4/5
Published by Viz Media and available September 10, 2024, I'm the Grim Reaper is the most visually striking webtoon I've seen. Most of the art is in a black and red palette, and backgrounds are taken from photographs and turned gray to match the color scheme. I'm very impressed, as most webtoons I've read have felt artistically generic and same-y. The story follows a newly-dead sinner who's made into a grim reaper with the job of collecting more sinners for Hell. This will appeal to fans of manga series like Death Note with for the focus on morality and who gets to live or die. This volume is a solid start to the mystery of who Scarlet is and what she did to deserve the ninth circle of Hell.
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Title: Destroy All Humans. They Can't Be Regenerated. A Magic: The Gathering Manga, Vol. 1
Author: Katsura Ise
Illustrator: Takuma Yokota
Rating: 5/5
Published by Viz Media and available October 8, 2024, Destroy All Humans immediately caught my nerdy eye. You mean there's a manga about Magic: The Gathering? Sign me up. Destroy takes place in the 1990s, following middle school rivals who step up their rivalry through MTG. The manga does a good job of introducing the reader to the different types of cards and how the game is played, and will appeal to existing fans of the game as well as newcomers interested in learning it. The art is very cool, bringing the in-game action to the reader. Fans of Yu-Gi-Oh or After School Dice Club will really enjoy this. As a fan of MTG, it's fun reading a hobby manga about something I'm into myself. I immediately recommended it to my friend and coworker A-Chan, who's our library's selector for teen manga and they loved it too and selected it for this coming month to go on the shelf, and they have no experience with MTG. Perhaps the best part of this is the relationship between rivals Hajime and Emi, and how they interact with the framework of the game they share.
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Author: Samuel Sattin
Illustrator: Steenz
Rating: 4/5
Published by HarperCollins Children's Books and available October 8, 2024, Side Quest appealed to me because recently I've been getting into Dungeons & Dragons. Guided by the author (I've read his excellent introduction to anime and manga for kids, A Kid's Guide to Anime & Manga: Exploring the History of Japanese Animation and Comics) Samuel Sattin and the illustrator Steenz, who are TTRPG (table-top roleplaying game) players themselves, the reader explores the history of roleplaying from its historical precedent in ceremonial performance and theater to the development of war gaming to our more familiar games like D&D (in fact, this book comes at the perfect time as D&D celebrates its 50th anniversary in 2024). I never really thought about the historical non-game background of games, though it makes sense. My two issues with it were 1) it could have discussed how RPG video games are connected in the history of RPGs, especially since they're wildly popular today with games like Final Fantasy, and 2) I had some trouble reading parts on both my phone and computer screen, which may be the fault of not reading a paper copy. That's more a publisher issue though. Other than that, this book is a great introduction to RPG history and will appeal to gamers and people interested in how a popular medium developed over time.
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Title: Home Office Romance
Author/Illustrator: Kintetsu Yamada
Rating: 3/5
Published by Kodansha and available November 12, 2024, Home Office Romance follows two housebound neighbors falling in love during the COVID-19 pandemic. I'm not a romance fan but I was interested in this since I heard about it in a webinar held by Kodansha and I'll admit I found it cute. There's been some nostalgia for the pandemic, which at once does and doesn't make sense to me-- the time was traumatic, deadly, and in my home country of the United States, stupidly controversial, so why would you miss it? At the same time, we have a tendency to romanticize traumatic things as a way of coping with and making sense of them. For many people working remotely was a revelation that work doesn't need to be conducted the way we've always been told it must. Home Office Romance gives us the chance to explore our contradictory feelings in the safe environment of fiction. My two issues with this book were 1) the male lead, Nokoru, didn't seem to be falling in love with the female lead, Natsu, as much as she was with him, but this might be because, as I stated at the beginning, I'm not a romance reader so I may not have picked up on things as much as a more seasoned reader would; and 2) I felt there could have been more pandemic content. To me it at times didn't seem to evoke much of the atmosphere of 2020, but that could be chalked up to cultural differences. I don't know how Japan handled the pandemic (probably better than America did if just for Japan's common courtesy of wearing masks when sick being an ingrained thing in society). So I really can't say how well it handles the pandemic. Overall, if you'd like a cute work romance that's complete in one volume, Home Office Romance is a good bet.
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Author/Illustrator: Sumi Eno
Rating: 3/5
Published by Viz Media and available November 19, 2024, After God is a new (to the English market) seinen battle manga, taking place in a post-apocalyptic Japan where being called gods wreak havoc. It's a decent start and I don't have much to say beyond it having Kaiju No. 8 vibes with the main character being a human with the powers of a god, so the story isn't particularly original, but the art is absolutely fantastic and I recommend reading it if just for the art.
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Author/Illustrator: Meredith Moriarty
Rating: 4/5
Published by Wattpad WEBTOON Book Group and available October 29, 2024 (just in time for spooky season), Third Shift Society Vol. 2 continues the supernatural exploits of Ellie and Ichabod. In the previous volume, Ellie discovered her psychic powers and began working for Ichabod, a supernatural detective who happens to have a pumpkin for a head. The illustrations are charming and spooky and the world is populated with diverse monsters, making it a treat for fans of series like All Saints Street. Ellie continues to be a likeable and relatable protagonist-- who among us wouldn't spring for a monster-hunting gig with a cool boss that pays well? This volume will most appeal to people who have already read the first volume/season on WEBTOON, but the series as a whole will appeal to fans of weird and wonderful media like Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Supernatural.
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Authors/Illustrators: Various
Rating: 4/5
Published by IDW and available October 29, Godzilla's 70th Anniversary is a comics anthology and as a Godzilla fan I had to request this, even though it's not my selection area. This comic celebrates 70 years of Toho's iconic kaiju. With thirteen stories and a full cast of your favorite monsters, there's something for everyone in thies collection. The book contains onshot stories and selections from series, including the first issue of one of my favorite Godzilla comics, Godzilla In Hell. Besides GIH # 1, my favorite inclusion might have to be "Ain't No Place for an Angel," written by Casey Gilley and illustrated by Liana Kangas and Brittany Peer, which places Mothra in the Old West. The book's varied art and storytelling styles make each part unique. This is sure to delight kaiju otaku and other sci-fi fans.
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Title: Hirayasumi, Vol. 3
Author/Illustrator: Keigo Shinzo
Rating: 5/5
Published by Viz Media and available November 19, this is the third volume of the iyashikei series Hirayasumi that I've read and reviewed. And I continue to be charmed by the art and story of this unique series. Hiro is a great laid-back character who brings a chill, kind presence to everyone in his life, and Nat is a relatable nervous wreck trying to become a mangaka. I find it hard to review subsequent volumes in a series because to fully enjoy them the reader has to have read the previous books, so I'll just say this series as a whole will appeal to fans of slice-of-life stories-- ones that deal with day-to-day experiences and people looking for a relaxing, heartfelt read.
