Animania

Back in February, I reviewed the first volume of the Blood+ manga adaptation. As I mentioned there, in addition to the manga adaptation, two light novel adaptations of the original Blood+ anime series were written and published in Japan. Both are licensed by Dark Horse, and the first volume of the main series, also entitled Blood+, has been released. Written by Ryo Ikehata, the series is illustrated by Chizu Hasahi. Each volume is subtitled, so to avoid confusion for the rest of the review, I'll refer to this first volume by its subtitle of First Kiss. Unlike with the manga, the main novel series is a fairly straight novelization of the anime events, with First Kiss covering the events in the first fourteen episodes of the series, with the introduction of the characters and Chiropterans, and the trip to Vietnam. All of the novels are divided into two "books", which each book divided into two parts and each part into varying numbers of chapters.

For those unfamiliar with the anime series, Blood+ tell the story of Saya Otonashi, a high school girl with amnesia who can't remember anything of her life beyond the last year. Her otherwise normal life is destroyed when she encounters monsters called Chiropterans, and discovers that she is the only one who is capable of killing them. Joined by the mysterious Hagi, who is her companion, and taken into the care of an organization called the Red Shield, each battle with Chiropterans causes Saya to learn more about the past she has forgotten, a past she realizes she needs to remember if she wants to protect her brothers and her new found companions, not only from the monsters, but from herself.

While the series is a novelization of the show and follows events pretty much right on track with the episodes, it adds more descriptions and more in-depth views of the characters thoughts and reactions to events. David, in particularly, comes across more sympathetically here than he did in the first parts of the anime, and Riku as being less bland. The writing is very well done, flowing well with descriptives that not only helped me remember the scenes from the anime, but visual them with greater depth. I also got a better feel for the individual characters and their motivations. Dark Horse's translation of the work is good, with only one or two minor typos. Like most companies releasing light novels, Dark Horses released the work in the typical manga size, though they did choose to keep the full color front pieces. All in all, this was an excellent read, and it was nice to have a novel keep me busy awhile instead of the usual quick 30 minute read of the typical manga volume. I'm looking forward to picking up the second of the four volumes, Chevalier, in July.

Rating: A

Okay, it isn't quite as soon as I'd been planning, but as I mentioned in my last review, in addition to the Chibi Vampire manga series, I'm reading the Chibi Vampire: The Novel series. The novel series is written by Tohru Kai, with the manga's writer Yuna Kagesaki providing the illustrations. The first novel was published a few months after the manga was released. So far, most light novel series I read that tie into an manga and/or anime series are either straight adaptations (like Blood+) or the original source material (Trinity Blood). Chibi Vampire: The Novel is neither. Instead, it is actually neatly tied into the manga, fitting within the manga story line at various points. The first novel is set between the events in volumes 1 and 2 of the manga and the second between volumes 2 and 3. The third and forth novels are set in the middle of the forth manga volume, during Karin and Kenta's summer break. The novels, of course, reference events and characters from the manga, but the manga also does the same. I think its great that Kagesaki and Kai worked so well together to enable the novels to work so well with the manga.

That said, one shouldn't think that Chibi Vampire: The Novel is the same as the manga, just in prose. The novel series was published under Fujimi Shobo's mystery label. As such, in each volume, Karin and Kenta get involved in various strange and mysterious events. In the first volume, Karin bites a rich high schooler named Youichiro Juumonji, but Anju's usual memory erasure doesn't completely work. In order to find the girl who "hugged" him and made his life better, Youichiro begins "kidnapping" girls from Karin's school to test hug them. He eventually gives this up and transfers to Karin's school. After quickly figuring out it was her, he begins pursuing her as his good luck charm. Kenta doesn't like any of this one bit. While Karin thinks Youichiro is an okay person, he also sends her into blood overload even worse than Kenta. When she learns Youichiro was behind the kidnappings, though, she isn't sure what to do, because all the girls who were kidnapped were also raped while they were drugged. Karin and Kenta have to figure out what really happened, before Karin becomes the next victim.

As you might guess, the Chibi Vampire novels are a bit more adult, to me, than the manga. Tokyopop puts cute and silly descriptions on the back, and labels them as comedies. While they have a lot of hilarious moments that had me laughing so hard I nearly cried, they also have some serious events happening, with multiple sexual assaults and harassment, attempted murders, and some rather vicious bullying in the four volumes I've read. So if you want silly, immature comedy, skip these, but if you can get past the bad Tokyopop descriptions and are looking for well-written and relatively well developed novels that expound on Karin and Kenta's continuing adventures, with lots of humor but with some nice twists and quite a few serious moments as well, go get these now. I am thoroughly loving them, particularly in reading them along with the manga series. Kai's commentary at the end of each volume also make for fun reading.

Though Tokyopop uses rather poor descriptions, their releases of the novels are otherwise nice. They only slightly modify the original Japanese covers to match the manga releases and the print is clear and large enough for me to read without my glasses but not insanely huge. I do with they would take a page from Seven Seas, and at least keep the color pages at the front. Tokyopop does include them, but they are all converted to black and white. Can't argue with the price point, with $7.99 a volume being right in line with any standard fiction paperback. I just hope that it doesn't end up like some of their other novels, and left uncompleted. So far, though, they seem to be committed to finishing them, with volume five due in July. I'll be picking it up, of course

Rating: A

In another foray into the japanese light novels, I picked up Ballad of a Shinigami, released by Seven Seas Entertainment. Seven Seas is a relatively new company, having started in 2004, focusing on English manga-inspired comics and webcomics before it began licensing and releasing real manga in 2005. They moved into light novels in 2007, with Ballad of a Shinigami being one of the first six titles they picked up and began releasing. Ballad of a Shinigami, which premiered in Japan in June 2003, is written by K-Ske Hasegawa and illustrated by the one-named Nanakusa. I was first introduced to the series in the form of its six episode anime series, which aired in 2006 and I watched via fansubs. The anime is unlicensed, but I enjoyed the touching stories. When I learned about the novels, and that they had been licensed, I looked forward to giving them a go.

Similar to Kino no Tabi, Ballad of a Shinigami is a series of shorter stories in which the central characters interact with other people. Unlike Kino, however, Ballad of a Shinigami's Momo isn't so much as an observer and traveler, as she is the catalyst for major events in those people's lives because she is a shinigami - a god of death who usually meets someone because they, or someone they are close to, is about to die. Momo isn't like other shinigami, however, in that rather than wearing all black and handling her job with grim efficiency, Momo wears white with red shoes and regularly cries for those whom she's met. She is almost always in the company of Daniel, her demon servant cat.

This first volume contains four stories in which Momo finds herself breaking the rules while performing her duties so as to allow people to take care of "unfinished business." Each story is takes a look into some of the various ways people view death and think about death, against the backdrop of human relationships that are at times touching, and disturbing. During these seemingly disparate stories, we learn more about the unusual shinigami Momo, and get a bit of foreshadowing that her being different has not made her afterlife pleasant at times, but still she manages to smile "beautifully." The relationship between she and Daniel is also quite an interesting story in and of itself, with their easy camaraderie and obvious affection for one another.

Light novels have had mixed success here in North America, so Seven Seas has decided to buck the trend in hopes of turning the tide. Ballad of a Shinigami has been released in the original size that light novels are released in Japan, which is "pocket size" making it very easy to hold in the hand, slip in a back pocket, or tuck in a purse. They included all of the color pages from the original, which are beautiful, with quite a few translation notes. This first volume is absolutely beautiful, as well as adorable, and I find myself regularly looking at it just to enjoy the view.

The series is still on-going in Japan, with eleven volumes released thus far. I'm curious as to how well Hasegawa will handle the need to keep the stories fresh, while also progressing with some of the underlying themes that have been hinted at here. I sincerely hope Seven Seas's gamble pays off and they will be able to keep going with the series to the end. The next two volumes have been solicited for May and November releases, respectively. I'll be picking them up as soon as they hit the stores as I want to read more tales of Momo's assignments, as well as learn more about this childlike Shinigami in the bright red shoes.

Rating: A+

Calling You started life as a Japanese light novel anthology, written by Otsuichi (pen name of Hirotaka Adachi). Published in Japan on May 31, 2001, it contains three short stories centered around friendships with a supernatural twist: Calling You, Kiz/Kids, and Flower Song. In December 2003, Setsuri Tsuzuki created a manga adaptation that contained the first two stories. Both the novel and the manga were licensed for release by Tokyopop, who released the manga first then the novel. I ordered them together, but the manga ended up arriving first, so I ended up reading them in the same order Tokyopop released them. I'll discuss both versions here, novel first then manga.

In the titular story, Calling You, high school freshman Ryo receives a random call from a boy named Shinya, only the phone that rings is her imaginary cell phone and Shinya is calling from his own imaginary phone! They strike up an unusual friendship, through Ryo is able to find her voice and begin talking in the real world again. Tragedy strikes, however, when the two finally decide they want to meet. Calling You has an unusual premise and is beautifully done. Though I normally abhor first-person point of view, I couldn't help being drawn into this story. Ryo's painful shyness from being unable to tell when people are being dishonest with their words, is palpable. Though short, the five chapter story packs in a lot of story and emotional punch. The ending was both sad and hopeful, though I wish it had taken the Il Mare route with Shinya.

The second story is Kiz/Kids, in which an unnamed boy is put in the special class at school because he attacked a classmate for picking on the burn on his back. The boy, however, has a good heart and primarily lashes out in violence out of seeing injustice or someone talking bad about his parents, even though his father abused him and his mother abandoned him. In the class, he meets Asato, a quiet boy who rarely talks after his mother murdered his father and tried to kill him. While alone with Asato after school, the boy hurts himself carving. Asato comes over and touches him, and half the wound leaves the boy's arm and moves to Asato's. It is an amazing secret, of course, and as their friendship grows, the boy comes to realize that Asato is taking on the wounds because he feels unwanted and wants to die. Kiz/Kids is a heart wrenching story, and its tough reading about these two children who have been abused, neglected, and overlooked all of their life and who deserve so much better. Neither are bad children, and while the boy says Asato has a pure heart, he doesn't realize that he does as well, in his own way. It is interesting that the boy is given no name through out the five chapters, though it may be indicative of how little the two are noticed that no one says it in his few interactions with adults. Still, this one, like the first, has an ending that is both sad and hopeful, but this one is more hopeful than Calling You.

Flower Song is the final, and perhaps trippiest, of all the stories. A woman is put in a mental hospital after a train accident that kills her lover and their unborn child, and also leaves her unable to have children ever again. She is put in a room with two men, Nakagawa and Haruki. Miserable, and depressed, the woman contemplates suicide until she discovers a singing flower with a human face. She takes it to their room and at first hides it from her roommates, but they noticed the singing and she eventually shares the secret with them. As they care for the flower and are soothed by her humming, their own mental wounds begin to heal, especially the woman's. They eventually learn the tragic past of a former patient, Misaki, who killed herself at the hospital at the tree where the flower was found. When released, the woman is determined to take Misaki back to the home she loved. Flower Song is the oddest of the three stories for a few reasons. The first, of course, is a flower with a human face and hair singing. :P The patient being a woman is also an unexpected revelation, considering she has two male roommates. The patient's thoughts as she sorts through her feelings of being hated by her family, her anger and blame towards them for their not accepting her lover and forcing them to elope that she feels is the reason he died, and her growing feelings towards the flower. The finale wraps things up very beautifully, though, and while we don't know how the patient will handle life, there is a sense of hope that she has gained some new internal strength through her association with the flower girl.

The Calling You novel is a very well done piece, with all three stories having similar themes, but presented in interesting and unique ways, though the first one is very reminiscent of one of my favorite Japanese movies Il Mare (mentioned above). Otsuichi has a way with words and for making first person point of view not seem so hideously bad, and Tokyopop's translation of the novel is very well done. Having said that, though, I must say Tsuzuki's manga adaptation, containing only the first two stories, is a very pale imitation to the original. I can see why Otsuichi says he "screamed" several times while reading it. Tsuzuki's makes many changes to the stories, some small (like changing names or giving the Boy from Kiz/Kids a name), and many big (such as Shinya being changed to a handicapped boy who can't talk). A lot of scenes are also redone, and not for the better. While the manga isn't completely hideous, but it does come up short. Perhaps if I hadn't read the novel, I could have fully enjoyed it, but I think I still would have seem some of the issues with it regarding holes that the novel does a better job of filling.

Novel Grade: A+
Manga Grade: B-

Volume Summary: The world is not beautiful, therefore it is. And destination is a state of mind... Kino wanders around the world on the back of Hermes, an unusual, anthropomorphic motorcycle. During their adventures, they find happiness and sadness, pain and decadence, violence and beauty, and above all, truth. Through it all, they never lose their sense of freedom.

Review: I enjoyed the Kino's Journey anime immensely, so of course I was curious about the novel line now that TokyoPOP has licensed them and is releasing them in translated form. I was, however, nervous as well. So far, my experiences with Japanese "light novels" translated to English have been rather dismal, particularly with DMP's downright hideous treatment of Passion. Some of the harder core fans of Kino no Tabi slammed the novels because TokyoPOP moved around two chapters, with what I think was chapter 4 becoming chapter 1 and I think the Coliseum chapter was also moved. Still, I bit the bullet and picked it up.

Oh, wow! Talk about a totally different experience from DMP! The translation was excellent, IMHO, and I honestly agree with moving that one chapter to the beginning. It is the only chapter written in first person point of view and it would have been jarring to have it in the middle, plus it would have been impossible to write the first three chapters using gender neutral language because the English language just wasn't made to work that way.

Story wise, Kino no Tabi is great. Leaning more about Kino and Hermes takes a bit of work, as most of the novel is written in a third person limited point of view, meaning the author reveals little about the personal feelings of the characters except through descriptions of their facial expressions, reactions, and actions. As Kino and Hermes journey from place to place, we also experience a through-provoking and intriguing look at humanity and the flaws of a pursuit towards perfection. Many of the stories focus on a city or town that tried to make the perfect town, only to make surreal nightmares, heartbreaking sadness, or rather amusing quirks. Several offer a look at some of commonly proposed ways we could fix society, and show why such ideas aren't always ideal. Usually with a novel like this, you expect a lot of big, flowery language that leaves those who don't eat dictionaries for breakfast scratching their heads. Fortunately, not this one. Kino no Tabi is written using fairly simple, easy to follow language.

All in all I highly recommend it for any fans of Kino's Journey, or anyone just wanting a nice, though provoking light novel. I'm looking forward to picking up the next book!

Rating: A